ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS

CHILDREN, SCHOOLS AND FAMILIES

The Secretary of State was asked—

Sex and Relationships Education

John Pugh: What assessment he has made of the effectiveness of school teaching on sex and relationships.

Jim Knight: The review of sex and relationships education has now been completed and the Government response to the review group's report was published on 23 October. The response includes a range of measures to raise the quality of SRE in schools, including our decision to make personal, social and health education statutory. It also includes action to address the key delivery challenges, the most significant of which is to improve the skills and confidence of those who deliver SRE.

John Pugh: I thank the Minister for that answer. This is a complex and important matter, on which the evidence is quite mixed. Does he share my view, based on some experiences, that many modern schools are more comfortable teaching about biology and the plumbing and, rightly or wrongly, experience more difficulty in teaching about relationships? What can be done practically to prevent lop-sided education from being given to children?

Jim Knight: I agree with the hon. Gentleman that it is important that young people are taught about sex within a moral framework and within one that teaches about relationships. That is one reason why I was persuaded by the arguments of the review group that we should make PSHE statutory. In primary schools, the focus should particularly be on relationships and their importance so that there is a proper setting for going on to talk about the sensitive matters around sex.

David Borrow: Does my right hon. Friend agree that there is a place in sex and relationships education for teaching about sexually transmitted diseases, particularly for ensuring that young people get a realistic and accurate appraisal of HIV/AIDS and its consequences?

Jim Knight: My hon. Friend is right that the subject of sexually transmitted diseases should be covered as part of sex and relationships education, on an age-appropriate basis, which currently means from secondary school age. It is compulsory for young people to learn about HIV/AIDS, and I am sure that that will continue to be the case.

Patrick Cormack: Does the Minister not accept that many parents—and, indeed, grandparents—of primary school children are extremely concerned that this should become statutory? They believe that the right place for children to be taught these things is in the home—and, in some cases, a church—and they do not want the mechanics of sex taught at a very early age and to see the further destruction of childhood innocence.

Jim Knight: I have always made it clear—I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving me the opportunity to make it clear again—that we are not proposing that five, six and seven-year-olds should be taught the mechanics of sex. We are suggesting that they should be taught about relationships, as I mentioned in response to the question of the hon. Member for Southport (Dr. Pugh).
	The hon. Gentleman is right that parents should be involved with the school in making decisions about what should be taught and when. It is very important that parents are properly engaged and that much of this education takes place at home, but we have to take account of the fact that on some occasions some children are not taught these things at home, so we need to able to fill in for that absence, in school.

David Taylor: As well as dealing in school with sexual relationships, we need to look at general and social relationships with adults. Has the Minister had the chance to look at the details of the Barnardo's survey of 2,021 people, which shows that 54 per cent. of adults believe that children are starting to behave like animals and that 45 per cent. believe that children merit the adjective "feral"? Unless the survey was drawn entirely from the  Daily Mail readership, can the Minister think of any other reason for such a distorted view of young people in this country?

Jim Knight: I am aware of that report and the reporting of it in the media today, but I have not had a chance to study it in full because of preparation for consideration of Lords amendments later today. I share the concern that I think was expressed by Martin Narey, the chief executive of Barnardo's. In my experience—there is considerable evidence to prove it—the vast majority of young people are responsible: they are more likely than any other age group, for example, to volunteer in our communities. We should do everything that we can to ensure that we provide positive images of young people to counteract the stereotype that sometimes comes across from certain parts of the media.

Philip Davies: Does the Minister not accept that the more sex education we seem to have had, the more unwanted and teenage pregnancies we seem to have had, and that more sex education is not the answer and that perhaps less or even no sex education might be better? Moral upbringing should be the responsibility of parents, not teachers, and if we really want to tackle this problem it would be much better to look at the benefits and housing allocation systems than throw in more sex education for pupils in schools.

Jim Knight: I am pleased to note from the expressions on the faces opposite that the hon. Gentleman's comments do not reflect the opinion of his party's Front Bench.
	All the international evidence that we examined suggests that the opposite is the case. The number of unwanted teenage pregnancies fell by 12.9 per cent. in this country between 1998 and 2006, but it is still too high in comparison with the numbers in other western European countries. In European countries that create, through schooling, an environment that makes people happier and more confident about discussing sex and relationships at home, we see the rates of unwanted teenage pregnancies fall.

Sports and Arts Participation

Judy Mallaber: What progress has been made towards implementing the Government's strategy to increase school sports and arts participation; and if he will make a statement.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: Since the introduction of the national strategy for physical education and sport, the percentage of pupils engaging in two hours of high-quality PE and sport each week has risen from an estimated 25 per cent. in 2002 to 90 per cent. in 2008. We are investing £332 million to 2011 specifically to increase music participation. Building on that, the Find Your Talent programme will trial ways of providing five hours of arts and cultural experiences in and out of school.

Judy Mallaber: Amber Valley has an outstanding sports development and leadership programme, including holiday programmes working with schools and even a mini-Olympics. The arts officers also do excellent innovative work with schools. Will my hon. Friend ask Amber Valley council to think again about whether it can possibly meet the sport and arts participation targets if it persists in its current plans for everyone in sport, arts and health development posts to be made redundant?

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I know that my hon. Friend is an ardent advocate of the good work being done in her constituency, particularly on sports development, sports leadership and arts and cultural events. It is of course for a local authority to decide how to allocate its budget, but I hope that that local authority will find ways of meeting the national targets that it is expected to meet, using the posts designed to meet them within its budget.

Daniel Rogerson: Facilities—as well as excellent teaching, of course—are crucial to delivering the targets. St. Tudy school in my constituency has been given a grant to fund a new school building, but it now faces a shortfall. Were it able to complete the project, it would have a proper school hall and outside facilities for the first time. Will the Minister or one of her colleagues agree to meet me to discuss how the funding shortfall might be overcome?

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I am pleased that there is to be a new school in the hon. Gentleman's constituency. It is important for new schools to have a broad range of facilities, but it is for local authorities to use the funds at their disposal to meet the national strategies that we have established and to deliver our requirement for school sports.

Gerald Kaufman: Will my hon. Friend join me in congratulating Wright Robinson specialist college, a sport and arts college in my constituency where a £47 million project was opened two months ago by the Prime Minister, on its fantastic achievement as most improved school of the year? Will she also note the wonderful artwork at Acacias community primary school, also in my constituency, which was shown when the school celebrated its centenary earlier this month? We have seen wonderful demonstrations of the talent and innovativeness of children throughout the country, but especially in my constituency.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I congratulate my right hon. Friend on the good work being done in his constituency. It demonstrates that both sport and arts can play their part in developing a rounded education for young people and giving them different activities in which to participate, especially at specialist sports colleges. Ten per cent. of secondary schools are now specialist sports colleges. We recognise that sport is an excellent way of involving young people involved in education, and we expect the Olympics to enthuse even more of them.

Angela Watkinson: Dance involves both physical activity and artistic benefits. What will the Minister do to make dance opportunities more widely available in our schools?

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: We intend to enable specialist dance colleges to work with other schools. I agree with the hon. Lady that dance is an excellent way of involving young people. One of the main problems with sport in schools is getting girls involved, and dance is an excellent way of getting them involved when they may not feel quite so keen on other forms of physical activity.

Derek Twigg: In my constituency, there has been a massive increase in sporting facilities in schools over the past 10 years. Participation is important and any increase is to be welcomed, but what is the Department doing to make sure we have more competitive sport, as competitiveness in schools is very important in improving our chances of success later on in various sports?

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I assure my hon. Friend that we are encouraging competitive sport in schools. We have a national network of 225 competition managers working in partnership with schools, alongside national school sport week and, of course, our UK school games.

David Evennett: I noted the Minister's original response, but is she not concerned that participation in sport among older children and teenagers is particularly low? Only 67 per cent. of pupils in year 10 and 63 per cent. in year 11 participate in the two hours of physical activity each week. What more can be done to encourage them to participate more?

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: It is important to recognise that there is a huge increase in the number of young people of all ages doing sport compared with six years ago when we first started this programme. There is a particular issue with pupils at key stage 4, and there is pressure on the curriculum, particularly when pupils are doing their GCSEs. We should note, however, that, overall, participation has risen among those pupils and that they have also achieved better GCSE results —so these aims are not actually in competition with each other.

Youth Crime Action Plan

Natascha Engel: Which local authorities are to receive additional funding through the youth crime action plan.

Edward Balls: The youth crime action plan sets out the Government's triple-track approach of tough enforcement, non-negotiable support and early intervention. We have committed £100 million to implement the plan, starting in 69 local authorities and, by 2010, all local authorities will have received a share of the additional funding.

Natascha Engel: I thank my right hon. Friend for that answer, but can he reassure me that as much is being done to promote positive images of young people as to deal with youth crime, particularly in the light of the Barnardo's report published today, which revealed that an alarming number of adults described young people and children as "feral" animals, with some even suggesting that teenagers should be shot?

Edward Balls: My hon. Friend has been a great campaigner for youth services and a positive view of young people. We must remember that it is often young people who are the victims of crime. It is important that a small minority are not allowed to ruin things for the vast majority of our young people, who are not only law abiding but wonderful examples of volunteering, working hard and doing best by their communities. It is important that we celebrate young people, but we must not let the minority ruin it for everybody else.

David Burrowes: I understand from the Government's press release that they selected the first tranche of 69 local authorities to be funded by using
	"a variety of data to help best focus resources on priority areas."
	May I give the Secretary of State some data? In the last year, seven young people have died in the borough of Enfield from knife crime. Is that not a sufficient number of wasted lives for it to be considered a priority for funding?

Edward Balls: As I said, every local authority will be receiving funding over the next three years, but we have started the funding in those areas where levels of crime, truancy and deprivation were highest. We will make sure that this happens in every part of country, because no community should be blighted by youth crime or the kind of terrible issues that the hon. Gentleman raised. It is important that in every part of the country we focus on preventing crime through the kind of early intervention set out in the children's plan; that matters in Enfield as in every part of the country.

Fiona Mactaggart: I strongly welcome the emphasis on early intervention as part of an anti-crime initiative, as well as positive activities for young people, but may I ask the Secretary of State to ensure that we have long-term research to find out just how powerful the impact of early intervention is? The High/Scope Perry project in America did not reveal how effective it was until about 30 years after the early-years intervention, when it could show that those young people were less likely to end up in prison and were more likely to go to university than their peers.

Edward Balls: It is vital that we have such evidence, but we already know that children with a special educational need, and those in care or with a parent or sibling who has spent some time in prison, are much more likely themselves to end up getting into trouble with the law. Given that we know that, we should be intervening early to make sure those children get extra support, starting in primary school. That is the right way to support them and their families, and to keep young people and our children on the right track.

Autism

Gordon Marsden: What guidance his Department plans to issue to children's trusts on the provision of an all-round regime of support for young people with autism up to the age of 16 years.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: The Department is planning to issue revised statutory guidance to children's trusts in November. The guidance is intended to explain what a children's trust is and what it needs to do to improve outcomes for all children. Children's trusts also have available to them the autism exemplar that we published in 2004 under the national service framework, which shows how multi-agency support should be provided to meet these children's needs.

Gordon Marsden: I thank the Minister for that answer. Her Department has supported the Autism Education Trust, which has just published a major report on the joint experience of families and schools in this area. The Department has done a great deal to support education and training in respect of autism, but will she carefully examine that report to see what more can be done to strengthen support on the social service side of children's trusts, as well as the educational side?

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I commend my hon. Friend's work in the field of autism. I have seen many examples of it, and I know that he works very hard in his constituency. I am also aware of Blackpool's good reputation; it is represented on our autism working group and provides a good example of work as part of a multi-agency approach. We will certainly keep in touch to see whether lessons can be learned from that. I emphasise that the multi-agency approach, which includes all people who are involved with children with autism, is part of the principle of children's trusts. As I said, they are not just for children with autism, but for all children.

Richard Benyon: It is too easy to forget the contribution that parents of children with autism make, and I cannot speak highly enough of the parents who set up the Spectrum club in Newbury. However, it runs only up to the age of 15 for children with autism, and it is trying to work with West Berkshire council to extend provision to cover the crucial years between 15 and 18. I would be grateful to know what the Minister can do to encourage provision in this key area, so that these children can continue to improve so dramatically that they can go on to achieve at university and beyond.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I entirely agree that we should be examining the transition to adulthood, particularly for young people with autism. The hon. Gentleman may be aware that in May the Department of Health announced the development of an autism strategy for adults and the transition to adulthood, and we shortly expect the outcome of the tendering for that. I agree that this is vital, because it is no good training children through school if we then do not manage the crucial transition stage of getting them on to further education and eventual employment.

Barry Sheerman: I realise that my hon. Friend has not been in her position for very long, but will she send a message to the whole of the Front-Bench team to stop shilly-shallying on this matter? We want more action. The Select Committee produced a report on special educational needs well over two years ago, and we expect faster improvement and sharper movement than has taken place, especially on what happens to children with a special educational need, particularly autism, post-16—the hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. Benyon) mentioned that. That age, 16-plus, is still a very dangerous and difficult time for children with special educational needs and their parents, and it is about time the Government pulled their finger out and did something.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I take on board my hon. Friend's comments, but it is important that we get it right—getting it right is more important than rushing in with something that might not do that. As I said to the hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. Benyon), this age is crucial for adulthood. It is part of our children's plan, and the Lamb review is examining innovative ways in which parents can be involved in the progress made by their children with autism, particularly during that crucial transition period.

Tim Loughton: Over the past 10 years, the number of special educational needs statements has fallen by more than a third while the number of appeals to SEN tribunals has, not surprisingly, doubled. More than a quarter of such appeals are for children who have autism. Would it not be a better start to providing support for children with autism if in place of highly adversarial, costly and stressful tribunal referrals, the Government instead promoted special needs mediation, involving parents, local authorities, independent educational psychologists and other professionals, in order to come up with agreed educational needs profile plans to help the children most and soonest by providing multi-agency support, not multi-agency buck-passing?

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I assure the hon. Gentleman that we certainly recognise the difficulties that parents have finding a way through the statementing process and addressing the special educational needs of their children. That is why we have commissioned the Lamb review. There are 10 innovative projects finding different ways to involve parents so that they have confidence in the system. We will review the outcome of those pilots to find best practice and what gives parents confidence, because that is the key to the problem.

Gisela Stuart: Will the Minister instruct the new children's trusts to take good notice of those institutions that have been very successful in dealing with children with autism, such as Baskerville school in my constituency? The danger is that they will try to reinvent the wheel, instead of turning to those who have had experience of doing well.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: It is important that we learn lessons of best practice, and that is what we are trying to do. We certainly have no intention of trying to reinvent the wheel, but it is important to listen to parents who tell us what the best practice is for their children. We are facilitating parents' groups, for parents of children with special educational needs and disabilities, so that they can share information among themselves. It is really important to use examples of best practice and see how we can disseminate them around the country.

Sure Start

Phyllis Starkey: How many Sure Start children's centres have been opened in Milton Keynes since the initiation of the scheme.

Beverley Hughes: There are 13 designated Sure Start children's centres in Milton Keynes, offering services to approximately 9,000 children aged under five and their families. The Government have allocated £14.7 million in capital and revenue funding to Milton Keynes in this spending review period to support existing centres and to develop a further seven centres by 2010 in order to achieve universal coverage for every single child.

Phyllis Starkey: I thank the Minister for that reply. The parents in my constituency who use children's centres know subjectively from their own experience how valuable the centres are. Does the Minister have any objective evidence of the value of children's centres generally, and can she comment on what would be lost if their funding were to be withdrawn?

Beverley Hughes: I thank my hon. Friend for her close interest in the development of children's centres, especially in her constituency. There is objective evidence from the national evaluation report on Sure Start. The latest report in March this year shows that children in Sure Start centre areas are benefiting significantly in some crucial areas compared with those who live in an area without a centre. The 2008 foundation stage profile results for this year also show that more five-year-olds are achieving a good level of development. Crucially, the gap between the lowest achieving 20 per cent. of children and the rest is beginning to close.
	In Milton Keynes specifically, 53 per cent. of children have achieved a good level of development, compared with 48 per cent. last year. The gap between the lowest 20 per cent. and the rest has closed from 37.7 percentage points to 32. 5 percentage points in 2008. That suggests—as my hon. Friend implies—that the children's centre programme is essential for the well-being of children and families and would be sorely missed were it not to continue.

Maria Miller: I listened carefully to the Minister's reply and found it disappointing that she chose not to say what the Government will do in response to the report in  The Lancet last week, which yet again showed that Sure Start is failing to hit half of its targets. Most worryingly, for children and families from an ethnic minority background, some of its impact is still negative. Would it not be better if the Government were to listen to all of the research, so that we can have a proper debate on all the facts and ensure that Sure Start becomes the success that it needs to be for every family in this country?

Beverley Hughes: The Lancet article simply rehearsed some of the findings in the national evaluation report in March to which I have just referred. It said that in five of the 14 areas there is now evidence of significant difference between children in Sure Start areas and others. Those crucial areas include the children's social development, behaviour and independence, the parents' ability to parent, the home environment and the use of services. In the other seven areas there is no statistically significant difference at the moment, but we are on a 10-year journey and we are continuing constantly to improve quality. I have no doubt that in time all those measures will show a significant positive difference in Sure Start areas.

David Chaytor: I thank the Minister for her recent visit to my constituency to see the work in progress at Broad Oak high school, which is the most recent high school to have a children's centre located on site. In view of the remarkable achievements of children's centres and their great popularity with parents, will she tell the House whether there is now cross-party consensus on the future development and funding of children's homes?

Beverley Hughes: That is a very interesting question, which I am not qualified to answer. Only last week, I was with the hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs. Miller) and, in front of an audience of children's organisations and academics concerned about children, she wanted to scotch the myth that the Conservative party is not in favour of Sure Start children's centres. She gave her assurance that it was, but we saw today that she has reverted to her default position of trying to undermine Sure Start at every opportunity.

Life Skills

Graham Allen: If he will take steps to improve the teaching of life skills to pupils between the ages of 11 and 16 years in deprived areas; and if he will make a statement.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: Personal, learning and thinking skills are embedded throughout the new secondary curriculum, which schools are encouraged to tailor to local circumstances and the needs of all pupils. Through PSHE, young people develop the social and emotional skills to make safe and healthy choices. On 23 October we announced our intention to make PSHE statutory, underlining our commitment to improving those skills among young people.

Graham Allen: Does the Minister accept that although teenage pregnancy is a serious problem it is only a symptom of a much broader problem? Young people, particularly in deprived constituencies such as mine, do not have the right social and emotional aspects of learning that will enable them to make the right decisions in a number of fields, leading to teenage pregnancy, antisocial behaviour and lack of educational attainment. Will she work closely with the Department of Health to continue the great work on teenage pregnancy, and also look beyond contraception towards early intervention so that we can reach the minds of those young people when they are aged 11 to 16 and they can be enabled to make the right choices in their lives?

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I know that my hon. Friend has worked hard in his area to tackle that issue. At the weekend, I viewed a DVD that has been made by young teenage mums in Nottingham. Without exception, they said that they would like to go back to the schools that they attended to tell young women not to make those choices—to tell them to use contraception and to learn how to use contraception. We have shown that effective delivery of local teenage pregnancy prevention significantly brings down rates, even in the deprived areas that my hon. Friend talks about. Our curriculum measures are in line with our recent decision to make PSHE compulsory. As we review the matter with Sir Alasdair Macdonald, we will certainly look at what we can include in those measures.

Graham Stuart: Does the Minister agree that life skills are best taught by parents backed by a full range of child-centred professionals? If she does agree, what is she doing to ensure that the work of school nurses is enhanced and not degraded?

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I certainly have no intention of trying to degrade the work of school nurses. Of course, life skills are best taught by parents but it is obvious that in many cases young people do not have parents with the confidence or even the ability to teach those life skills. That is why we are looking at the PSHE curriculum in schools and looking at innovative ways in which to use that curriculum. As I have said, a review is taking place that will report next April, when we will be able to consider ways in which we should use the new statutory curriculum in order to deliver the skills that the hon. Gentleman is talking about.

Diane Abbott: Does the Minister agree that if both life skills and parenting skills were taught better to adolescents in deprived areas we would see fewer incidents of child abuse? Given incidents of gross abuse, such as the baby P case, does the Minister agree that it is regrettable that not much more progress has been made on the Laming inquiry recommendation about making senior service managers more accountable? It is surprising to many of us that the director of social services in Haringey has not seen fit to tender her resignation.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: We are well aware that there is an ongoing inquiry and investigation, and at this stage I do not want to comment on that in the House.
	It is important that we talk to young people about parenting skills for mothers and fathers. One of the striking testimonies given by the young people in the DVD was that in all but one instance the teenage fathers of the babies did not hang around. All the young women said that it was important that those skills were taught in schools not just to young women but to young men as well.

Brian Iddon: Does my hon. Friend agree that it is extremely important that all of us engage in conversation with our primary or secondary schoolchildren so that they can learn about the elective processes and how we can help them in future should they require help, and that in return we should listen to their opinions and worries?

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: A lot of work is being done with youth councils and youth parliaments. It is important that we listen to the voice of young people. I was recently able to sit in on a meeting of young people from Derbyshire youth council, at which they expressed to me some of their hopes and concerns. It is important that we continue to listen to the voice of young people so that we and their teachers—and school nurses—can talk to them in a language they can understand.

Brian Jenkins: I am pleased that my hon. Friend has brought families to the fore in the teaching of life skills. Does she recognise the need for more family and community education units? Children need to talk to their parents pre-11, and the approach of schools should be to the whole family, not the individual child.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I entirely agree that it is important to bring parents into the educational environment. With reference to the question about Sure Start centres answered by my right hon. Friend the Minister for Children, Young People and Families, we can get parents involved with children's centres and Sure Start to give them the confidence to bring up their children and answer their questions, bringing in those wider well-being and life skills right from the start.

Youth Facilities

Rosie Cooper: What plans he has for expenditure on youth facilities in West Lancashire over the next two years.

Edward Balls: My Department has allocated a total of £1.7 million to Lancashire county council through the youth capital fund for investment in youth facilities over the period 2008-11.

Rosie Cooper: Will my right hon. Friend comment on the impact of the youth opportunity fund and the youth capital fund across the country and in West Lancashire in particular?

Edward Balls: We are making real progress with many hundreds of thousands of young people benefiting from the investment made in recent years, but there is much more to do. I am sure that in my hon. Friend's constituency—as in all our constituencies—a common theme is that young people, adults and pensioners all say that we need more places for young people to go after school and at weekends and more things for them to do, so that they do not just hang around on the streets. We are investing that money to make sure that there are facilities for young people in constituencies across our country.

Ofsted Inspections

Lindsay Hoyle: What progress has been made in his Department's review of the conduct of Ofsted inspections; and if he will make a statement.

Jim Knight: Ofsted has consulted on and is currently developing proposals for a more differentiated school inspection system, under which the frequency of inspections for good and outstanding schools will reduce.

Lindsay Hoyle: I welcome that answer, because the question I would have posed was that it makes absolute nonsense that continuously well-performing schools have to be completely disrupted for two days but do not even have a proper inspection. Now that my right hon. Friend will be streamlining that part of the system, will he ensure that schools that continuously perform badly get extra help and assistance not just from Ofsted reports but with guidelines on where they can improve? We all want to see the lifting of school standards, not bashing well-performing schools over the head all the time.

Jim Knight: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that, and I agree with much of what he says; it is important that Ofsted's inspections are risk based, and that we focus attention on schools that are not doing well enough. Under proposals on which Ofsted are consulting, it will increase the proportion of satisfactory schools that are sampled from 5 per cent. to 10 per cent., so that we can ensure that we keep an eye on them. Through programmes such as the national challenge, we are focusing a lot of resources—£400 million, in respect of that scheme—on improving the schools that need it most.

Simon Burns: Will the Minister suggest how we can ensure a seamless system of inspection, whereby we do not lose the benefits of inspection, but cause minimum disruption to schools prior to inspection?

Jim Knight: The direction of travel has been away from the long notice that used to be given to schools, which caused a lot of disruption and distorted behaviour, to short-term notice of less than a week. That minimises disruption but gives some preparation time. Ofsted proposes to pilot no-notice inspections in some circumstances, to see whether that can improve things further. However, those are matters for Ofsted, which is independent of the Department; it is a non-ministerial Government department, and it is up to Ofsted to make its decisions.

Ken Purchase: Does the Minister not recall that Ofsted now spends more than £400 million per annum on inspections? Frankly, many of the inspections are not helpful, and are carried out by people without the right experience for dealing with the schools they are inspecting. Could he not start to save some of that money by abolishing the post of the academies adviser, who has now gone off to the private sector to a fundamentalist education trust?

Jim Knight: As my hon. Friend knows, I hate to disagree with him, but I have every confidence in the job that Ofsted is doing. It has an enlarged brief; it is responsible for inspecting a wide range of settings, not just schools. That might explain why the cost of running Ofsted has gone up. Post-inspection surveys of head teachers show that 96 per cent. of schools agree that inspections identified the right issues for improvement, and 83 per cent. agree that the benefits of the inspection outweigh any negative aspects. The outgoing schools commissioner has not, to my knowledge, ever worked for Ofsted; he certainly does not do so at the moment, and it is not proposed that he should go on to do so.

Nick Gibb: The Minister just said that he has confidence in what Ofsted is doing, but Christine Gilbert, the chief inspector of schools, has said that improvement of standards in our schools has "stalled". Does the Minister agree?

Jim Knight: I certainly do not agree that standards have stalled in our schools. We will have to wait and see what the chief inspector of schools says in her annual report later this week about whether improvement in our schools has stalled.

CAFCASS

Henry Bellingham: When he next expects to meet Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service officials to discuss their work.

Beverley Hughes: The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families, Baroness Morgan of Drefelin, who has responsibility for children, young people and families, meets CAFCASS regularly, with the next meeting scheduled for December.

Henry Bellingham: The Minister will be aware that CAFCASS reports often play a vital role in influencing court decisions, but is she aware that aggrieved parties have no right of complaint against CAFCASS, and that there appears to be little, if any, accountability? For example, I know of a case in which an aggrieved parent wrote a letter to his regional complaints manager on 9 January 2008, and eventually got an eight-line reply on 14 April 2008. Surely that is a disgrace. What does she plan to do to make CAFCASS more accountable?

Beverley Hughes: If the hon. Gentleman wants to send me details of that case, I will pass it on to my ministerial colleague, and I am sure that she will be happy to look into it. On the face of it, I agree that waiting three months for a reply is not acceptable. Having said that, in general terms, as a result of recent Ofsted reports, CAFCASS is undergoing a significant improvement programme. There is an issue to do with consistency of practice in different regions, and it is being addressed through the improvement programme. However, if the hon. Gentleman lets me have the details, I will do what I can to pursue the matter.

School Standards

Jim Cunningham: What recent steps the Government have taken to raise educational standards in schools.

Jim Knight: Since 1997, school standards have risen substantially—I am sure that the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb) is listening to this, because it refers to his previous question—thanks to a range of measures, including increased investment, excellent leadership and teaching, renewed primary and secondary teaching frameworks, better use of pupil data, and the targets that schools and local authorities have set for their pupils. The national challenge programme launched in June aims to raise standards in schools where fewer than 30 per cent. of pupils achieve five or more good GCSEs, including English and maths, and we have announced the next phase of our secondary school improvement strategy, "Gaining Ground: Improving progress in coasting secondary schools". There is no sign of complacency.

Jim Cunningham: I thank my right hon. Friend for that answer, but what are schools doing to encourage more youngsters to go into vocational education, which, as I am sure he realises, opens up many doors for a lot of young people who are disadvantaged in life?

Jim Knight: My hon. Friend is right that we need to expand vocational education; that is why, through the publication of "World-class Apprenticeships", we are committed to expanding the uptake of apprenticeships. Our aspiration is that by 2020 one in five young people will be starting apprenticeships. In addition, by creating the diplomas, which are a rich mix of academic and vocational learning, we will provide a different pathway for people to get into vocational learning through their education.

Topical Questions

Philip Hollobone: If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

Edward Balls: The whole nation has been deeply shocked, appalled and angered by the tragic death of 17-month-old baby P. I know that Members across the whole House will have been contacted by constituents to express their revulsion that a small boy could suffer such abuse in this day and age, and their disbelief that this could happen again in Haringey.
	Immediately following the legal verdict last Tuesday, I asked Lord Laming to report to me with an urgent assessment of how the reforms introduced following the Victoria Climbié inquiry are being implemented across the country. On Wednesday at 10 am, the Minister for Children, Young People and Families and I received the full serious case review. I was deeply disturbed both by the detail of the abuse suffered by baby P and by the failings of practice and management that it highlighted.
	On Wednesday afternoon, and with the agreement of Haringey, I immediately arranged the secondment of the director of children's services in Hampshire, John Coughlan, to ensure that proper procedures for safeguarding children in Haringey are in place and being applied. I also asked our national inspectors—Ofsted, the Healthcare Commission and the chief inspector of constabulary—to conduct an urgent and thorough inspection of the safeguarding of children in Haringey and to report to me in two weeks' time. Mr. Coughlan began his work immediately last Thursday morning, and the work of the independent inspectors is under way. They will report to me by 1 December, and as soon as I have studied their findings I will publish Ofsted's report and the action we will take.
	In addition, I met Lord Laming this morning to agree the scope of his review, which will cover the key features of good practice and whether they are being universally applied across the country; the key barriers, including in the legal process; and what specific actions need to be taken to accelerate systematic improvement across the country, including on the issue of the independence of local safeguarding children boards. I am placing copies of my letter to him in the Libraries of both Houses. Tomorrow, I will set out the legislation that we will introduce to strengthen local arrangements to promote the safety and well-being of children across the country through statutory children's trusts.
	Professionals working with children in this country do a tough job, often in very difficult circumstances. However, where serious mistakes are made, there must be accountability, and I will not hesitate to act on the findings of the inquiry into what went wrong in Haringey and of Lord Laming's review. Our responsibility, working together, is to ensure that children are safe and protected from abuse, and we will not rest until we have the very best possible child protection arrangements to safeguard our most vulnerable children in every part of the country.

Philip Hollobone: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. I usually allow the Secretary of State an opening statement of one minute, but that was well over a minute. A statement should be questioned by the Opposition parties. I therefore expect that some time this week the Secretary of State will come to the House and allow the main Opposition parties to question him, as well as, of course, all Back Benchers who want the opportunity to do so.

Philip Hollobone: On another subject, the ocarina is an easy-to-play, easy-to-learn, easy-to-teach circular flute, and the centre of the UK's ocarina industry is in Kettering. My constituents, David and Christa Liggins, actively promote the use of this low-cost musical instrument in schools across the country. Would the Secretary of State agree to meet my constituents and me to discuss how this low-cost instrument might help the Government to teach more school pupils how to play musical instruments?

Edward Balls: I have heard ocarinas played many times, and my ministerial colleague would be happy to arrange a meeting.
	On the wider issue, Mr. Speaker, I am happy to answer questions at any time. I thought that it was important to update the House on my meeting with Lord Laming at the earliest opportunity.

Mr. Speaker: Of course it is important, but a ministerial statement is so important that it must immediately be followed by questions from Her Majesty's Opposition. We are not able to do that today, and I make that very clear indeed.

Michael Gove: The Secretary of State has rightly pointed out that after the Victoria Climbié tragedy, Haringey should have been an exemplar authority for child protection. I am sure that he will agree that the Government should show exemplary energy in pursuing concerns about child protection in Haringey. Six months before baby P died, Ministers received a warning letter from a former Haringey social worker. It was passed to the Commission for Social Care Inspection, which held a meeting in which Haringey council promised speedily to improve its policies on safeguarding children. Two weeks later, responsibility for inspecting child protection passed to Ofsted. What steps did Ministers, Ofsted or anyone in the Government take to ensure that Haringey lived up to its promise to improve child protection?

Edward Balls: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his support for the review into Haringey social services that I instigated last Wednesday, and for giving me notice that he would raise the issue today. I sent him and other Opposition spokespeople a copy of my letter to Lord Laming.
	A letter came from a lawyer for a former employee of Haringey, which went to the Department of Health. It was passed to the former Department for Education and Skills. It was not seen by Ministers. It was handled in the normal way through official channels. At that time, a reply was written to the lawyer to say that Ministers could not be involved in a particular employment case and that the right way to take the matter forward was through the social care inspectorate. That was done by the lawyer, and that process was followed up by a meeting in which the inspectorate confirmed that it was content that things had been done properly by Haringey in that case.
	On the wider issue of Haringey social services, there was a review in 2006, and a further review by Ofsted in 2007, which gave a good report. It did not look at the particulars of the legal case; it looked at matters more widely. An investigation is now going on because I have sent the inspectors in. They will report to me in two weeks' time, and I will take whatever action is needed to ensure that children in Haringey are safe.

Michael Gove: I am sure that the Secretary of State appreciates that this is a question about the inspection regime. We know that in March the inspectors said that Haringey had to improve, and that in October Ofsted said that Haringey—and this was just after baby P had died—provides a good service for children. That report was based mainly on paperwork and desk research, and the author of that report was a former employee and colleague of the director of children's services in Haringey. Is the Secretary of State satisfied that the systems for inspecting child protection are sufficiently robust when that can happen?

Edward Balls: I very much welcome the opportunity to discuss these matters in more detail, as the House allows. The report in question was not authored by any colleague of the director of children's services in Haringey at all. She was not the author of that investigation. There was an investigation by CSCI into particular allegations; it was content that they had been dealt with properly and closed the case.
	Separately from that case, following the 2006 inquiry into safeguarding in Haringey, there was a further, routine investigation in the autumn of 2007, which, as the hon. Gentleman said, gave a good report. It did not involve inspectors' reports and visits to Haringey—that was not the nature of the investigation. I have now called the inspectors into Haringey to see what needs to be done, and to see whether the issues that emerged from the serious case review are being properly implemented. I want to ensure that there is proper accountability and that we are doing whatever it takes to make sure that children in Haringey are safe. That is the right way to proceed. I will proceed in the right way, and we will ensure that everything is done to make sure that children in all parts of the country are being properly protected.

Phil Wilson: I welcome the review by Lord Laming that the Secretary of State announced. Will my right hon. Friend assure the House that he will review the role of local safeguarding children boards? Does he believe that the chairs of such boards should be independent? Will the report also consider the way in which serious care reviews are conducted?

Edward Balls: On 22 October, we said that we would examine the operation of local safeguarding children boards, including independence and the conduct of serious case reviews. Evidence from the Ofsted reports in June shows inadequacies in some case reviews around the country. In my letter today, I have asked Lord Laming to consider both how to improve serious case reviews and the independence of those boards' chairs. In my view and that of the children's Minister, independence is a better way of proceeding. If we need to change guidance or the law to achieve that, we will do so on the basis of Lord Laming's recommendations.

David Laws: We obviously welcome the current investigation into the tragic events in Haringey. However, is not it already obvious from the evidence in the public domain that an inquiry that takes place over a period of just two weeks will be inadequate in getting to the bottom of the issues? Is not it clear that we need a public inquiry to establish exactly what happened in Haringey and why the lessons of the 2003 report have not been learned?

Edward Balls: I asked for an urgent inspection from Ofsted, the Healthcare Commission and the constabulary. I said that "urgent" meant that I had to have a first report in two weeks. If they judge that they need more time to prepare a second report, that is fine, but I want action in two weeks and that is why I have set the timetable. The right thing to do is to examine what happened—the management failures, the problems of process and how that led to the wrong judgment, it seems, being made about the safety of the child. As I said, I am going to do that properly. I will wait for the inspectors and then act on the basis of their first report, which will come to me on 1 December.

Andrew Gwynne: Use of the internet, e-mail and text messaging to bully others is, sadly, on the increase. As this week is national anti-bullying week, what more can the Government do with schools and youth services to ensure that the message is clear that bullying, whatever form it takes, is not acceptable?

Edward Balls: The important thing is that, in every school, parents, teachers, children and young people need to work together to say that bullying is wrong, that it will not be tolerated and that we will do everything we can to ensure that it does not happen. Furthermore, we are announcing today funding to extend the Diana award for two more years so that children and young people who do that work in their communities are properly recognised for their important contribution to the safety and well-being of children in our schools.

Bob Russell: The Secretary of State is aware of proposals from Chelmsford-based Essex county council to shut two secondary schools in my constituency. If Colchester borough council comes forward with its own option, will the Secretary of State or a member of his ministerial team agree to meet a delegation from Colchester? Will he give that view the same consideration as whatever emerges as the Tory council's preferred option?

Jim Knight: Thanks to the hon. Gentleman, the issues in Colchester are never far from my mind, and I am grateful to him for passing on clippings from the  Gazette. He knows that we need to change in Colchester to improve standards and that Essex county council, the Chelmsford-based organisation to which he referred, will make the organisational decisions. On that basis, if he considers it worth while, I am happy—as ever—to have another meeting with him.

Kerry McCarthy: When the Secretary of State last visited Bristol, we met the seven heads of the local authority national challenge schools. Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is even more important in times of economic downturn to produce children with decent qualifications and skills? What does he think that the national challenge will help to achieve to that end?

Edward Balls: As my hon. Friend will know, we have already agreed the plans for Bristol, which will involve a further academy, bringing the number up to, I believe, eight in Bristol, and a further £500,000 of funding, to ensure that every child receives the support they need and that all schools are helped to get above our basic benchmark. We will achieve a goal that would have been impossible to contemplate 10 years ago, which is that every school in every community, for every parent and every child, will be a good school. That is our progressive commitment.

Anne McIntosh: Will the Secretary of State share with the House what plans he has for correspondence on children in protection and children at risk to be reviewed by his ministerial team?

Edward Balls: As I just said, I investigated the matter last week, as did our permanent secretary. I am assured by him that at the time—this was in the previous Department, the Department for Education and Skills—the correspondence unit took advice from the expert policy team, whose judgment it was that in statute the matter was rightly for the independent inspector, not the Department. However, it is of course the case that at all times officials and Ministers have to make the right judgments to ensure that problems are spotted early and that action is taken. That is what we will do at all times and in all cases.

Desmond Swayne: Given the excellent advice that the Chairman of the Children, Schools and Families Committee, the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr. Sheerman), gave earlier, will the Minister tell us exactly what she is going to do to improve the statementing process so that parents believe that it is on their side, rather than designed to defeat them? In doing so, will she avoid the words "best practice", "facilitator" and "engaging", which she used earlier? She should just tell us what she is going to do.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I am surprised that the hon. Gentleman objects to the words "best practice". I would have thought that we should all be using best practice. Indeed, I believe that schools and local authorities should be looking at it. I have already stated that the Lamb review is looking into how we can get parents' confidence in the statementing system. We have 10 innovative projects under way throughout the country, so that we can find different ways of getting parental confidence in the system. I would have thought that the hon. Gentleman welcomed that.

G20 Summit

Gordon Brown: I am sure that the whole House will join me in sending our profound condolences to the family and friends of the three servicemen killed in Afghanistan in the past few days. They were Marines Neil Dunstan and Robert McKibben from the UK Landing Force Command Support Group, and Colour Sergeant Dura of the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Gurkha Rifles. We owe them and all those who have given their lives in conflict a huge debt of gratitude.
	I should like to make a statement on the Washington summit on financial markets and the world economy. This was the first ever G20 leaders' summit, which I attended this weekend with the Chancellor of the Exchequer. In just over six months, the world has seen a 40 per cent. collapse in global share values, while global financial institutions have written off losses approaching $1,000 billion and world oil prices have peaked at nearly $150 a barrel and then sunk 60 per cent. We have seen a fall in global expectations for growth in the world's industrialised countries from 2.5 per cent. in 2007 to below zero for 2009, with all the impact that that has on families and businesses and all the worries about mortgages, jobs and family security in Britain and around the world.
	What is making this a fully worldwide crisis is that in recent weeks a problem that started in America has extended to emerging markets and developing countries, some of which are facing bankruptcy. These unprecedented global events call for unprecedented global action. While the economic problems of the 1970s created the G5 and then the G7, it is right that for the first time leaders from developed, emerging and developing economies, which are responsible for 85 per cent. of global growth, met and agreed on the urgency of common and concerted, and where appropriate co-ordinated, actions to address the financial and economic crisis.
	To put the long-term challenge in context, in the next 20 years it is expected that the world economy will double in size. This will mean a doubling of opportunities for British business and new opportunities for British workers and families. However, to make the transition to, and secure the benefits of, an open and inclusive globalisation, we have to deal with three other consequences that that brings. Those are, first, the need for restructuring of industries and services, not least resulting from the rise of Asia; secondly, increased competition for resources as long-term demand for oil, food and commodities from the newly emerging economies threatens to outstrip supply; and, thirdly, now that we have global flows of capital, the need to ensure a global framework for financial services as a precondition for prosperity and security.
	As epitomised by the sub-prime crisis, which started in America, at the root of the banking crisis was a failure by banks to manage risk, to understand increasingly opaque and complex financial products and to make transparent a developing shadow banking system— [ Interruption. ]

Mr. Speaker: Order. I am always on the record as saying that I want Ministers, including the Prime Minister, to come to the House to make statements. That does not give hon. Members, including hon. Ladies, a licence to shout anyone down.

Gordon Brown: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
	In Washington, we agreed first of all fundamental reform of the way the financial system is supervised around the principles that Britain has been promoting. They are greater transparency, responsibility, integrity—to avoid conflicts of interest—better banking practice and international co-operation. That includes establishing international colleges of regulators; bringing transparency to tax havens by including them within the scope of the financial system; convergence of accounting standards; reviewing executive compensation schemes that encourage excessive and irresponsible risk-taking; full disclosure of toxic assets; and reform to end conflicts of interest in credit-rating agencies. We set a clear timetable, tasking our Finance Ministers to prepare immediate measures for implementation by 31 March, and to report back on progress with the full action plan at the next meeting.
	The summit also agreed that the recapitalisation of the banking system was the right course of action. The action that we have taken in the United Kingdom to buy shares in banks has now been followed in every continent of the world, and guarantees have been introduced to allow banks to raise the money needed to continue to support the real economy, as they must, through lending to businesses and families.
	We agreed that, against the background of economic conditions worldwide, a broader policy response was needed immediately, based on closer macro-economic co-operation. Importantly, we made it clear that, within our commitment to fiscal sustainability, the broad and international policy response would need to encompass both monetary and fiscal policy action. Although it is for independent central banks to make their own decisions, we recognised the importance of monetary policy to the restoration of growth. Some contended that it was impossible to cut interest rates in Britain for fiscal reasons, but, in fact, the Bank has now, in two successive months, made two cuts worth in total 2 per cent. and the Government have stated clearly that there is scope for further action. A measure of the level of international co-operation that has already resulted is the extensive currency swaps put in place between central banks and the co-ordinated cut in interest rates across Europe, Asia and America a few weeks ago.
	Crucially, and for the first time, our Washington statement agreed a broad and concerted international macro-economic policy response in fiscal policy, meaning measures to support families and businesses now. First, we agreed that fiscal policy has an essential role to play alongside monetary policy in sustaining demand, with quick-acting measures to encourage a rapid impact with help for households and businesses. Secondly, we agreed that the benefits of fiscal policy action will be greater for each country if all countries can act in a concerted way.
	This imperative is shared internationally. In recent days China, South Korea, Australia and Germany have joined other European countries, including Spain and France, in considering new fiscal stimulus packages. The European Union has already said that the flexibility in the stability and growth pact to recognise exceptional and temporary conditions will be used. President-elect Obama has already stated that a new fiscal stimulus package in the United States is both necessary and urgent. Most previously published forecasts have assumed the absence of co-ordinated fiscal action, but the downturn can be shorter and less deep if Britain takes action, and if that action is matched elsewhere.
	It is for individual countries to make their own announcements, as we will do in due course, but the more co-ordinated the action, the greater the benefit to each country will be. I believe that the emerging consensus across the world—from the International Monetary Fund itself, from Governments of left and right, and from political parties, with only a few exceptions, in developed and developing countries—is that we should take rapid, co-ordinated and concerted action through the use of budgetary measures.
	Over the past year, the central problem facing the global economy and the UK economy was inflation, driven by a sharp rise in international commodity prices and allied to a credit crunch, which left fewer options for Governments. This year, the reality is the sharp falls in commodity prices that are now taking place, while the credit crunch is leading to contractions in bank lending. The risk in this new environment is not stagflation but the impact on the economy of close-to-zero inflation at the time of a downturn, so it makes sense for Governments to support interest rate cuts with fiscal action. That is giving real help to families and businesses now, and I believe that, in addition to the announcements already made, we will see in the next few weeks many countries following with expansionary measures founded on that agreed international position.
	The third central message of the summit is that in taking action, we must resist all forms of protectionism. These threaten to slow down and eventually to stall world trade, thus denying us the benefits of one of the great engines of new growth. So, uniquely, all nations signed an agreement that over the next 12 months they will resist pressure and refrain from raising new barriers to investment and trade. The key to confidence in open trade is, of course, the signing of the world trade agreement, on which talks have stalled since the summer. We cannot allow that impasse to continue, and I welcome today's new agreement—following Saturday's summit—to work towards a ministerial meeting in December. To ensure that the trade round is truly a development round that benefits the poorest countries, it will be accompanied by an agreed $4 billion aid-for-trade programme for infrastructure in developing countries. In discussing the issues facing poorer countries, the summit reaffirmed the importance of meeting the millennium development goals—an importance of applying the same common purpose to the challenge of alleviating poverty.
	Some have argued that as long as the trade talks remain deadlocked on specific issues, no deal can be agreed, but the G20 was explicit about the action that we have to take: for the first time we have instructed our Trade Ministers to agree, by the end of the year, the outlines needed for a successful conclusion to the Doha agreement.
	Finally, the G20 leaders have also agreed that the next summit will allow us to review, and to make decisions on, the wholesale reform of the international economic architecture—built in 1945 but no longer adequate for the challenges of 2008. In agreeing on the need for reform, we also set down the agreed changes that we believe are already essential: a greater voice and representation for emerging and developing countries; an urgent expansion, with broader membership, of the Financial Stability Forum; and, better identification of vulnerabilities and anticipation of potential stresses, with swifter action in crisis response.
	The International Monetary Fund's ability to assist countries facing problems as a result of the current shock depends on its reserves of $250 billion. We welcome the announcement from Japan to lend up to $100 billion, but that may not be enough, and we agreed to review the IMF's facilities to ensure that it has the flexibility to give countries the help that they need. The World Bank agreed that it would make new commitments of up to $100 billion over the next three years to protect the newest, the poorest and most vulnerable countries, and $30 billion-worth of new facilities specifically to help address the problems faced by the private sector, including recapitalising banks and providing trade finance.
	At this unique moment in our economic history, we are seeing the world come together to find global solutions to what are the global problems that we face. Over the next few weeks and following consultation, Britain, as the incoming chair of the G20, will lead the preparations for the next summit, working alongside past and future chairs. We will set out the schedule of events, meetings and papers that will take us to the next conference, the date and venue of which will be announced next week. In the run-up to the conference, we will monitor, following the recapitalisation of banks, the barriers to the resumption of funding, because this summit and the meetings that will follow are about the real challenges of everyday life: the need for people to have confidence in the banks that hold their savings and their mortgages; and the need to know that everything possible is being done to help them in their jobs. We pledge that with national and international action together—real help in difficult times—we will take people fairly through this downturn. I commend this statement to the House.

David Cameron: I join the Prime Minister in paying tribute to Colour Sergeant Dura and to Marines Neil Dunstan and Robert McKibben, who were all killed in Afghanistan. As the Prime Minister said, they were serving our country, and we honour their memory.
	Everyone welcomes the fact that the summit was of the full G20, involving countries such as Brazil, India and China. It discussed the immediate response to the recession and proposals for the longer term. I shall start with the longer-term reforms. On trade, after so many false dawns, does the Prime Minister believe that this time there is a real prospect of agreement on Doha? On financial reform, there are the Basel accords, which govern bank lending. For a year, we have been arguing that the rules should be made counter-cyclical, but does the Prime Minister agree with me that international action should be combined with action at home, such as the debt responsibility mechanism that we have proposed for the Bank of England to call time on debt? On international institutions such as the IMF, does the Prime Minister agree with me that genuinely sharing global leadership with countries such as India and China means giving them a larger say in how these organisations are run?
	The section in the communiqué on the IMF includes talk of early warnings. Is it not also vital that countries listen to the warnings that they are given? The IMF warned Britain last year that household debt was rising rapidly, that our financial institutions were vulnerable and that, as a result, we faced a potentially severe impact. In future, will the Prime Minister listen to these warnings?
	Next there is the failure of the regulatory system, particularly concerning credit rating agencies and complex derivatives. The G20 rightly talks about the importance of co-operation, but can the Prime Minister be clear about what is actually proposed? It does not mean detailed international regulation, but international co-operation over regulation. The G20 communiqué rightly states explicitly:
	"Regulation is first and foremost the responsibility of national regulators".
	It is quite damning about national failure. It says—this is the communiqué that the Prime Minister signed up to—that
	"some policy makers did not adequately appreciate and address the risks building up in financial markets, keep pace with financial innovation, or take into account the systemic ramifications of domestic regulatory actions."
	For the past 10 years, the Prime Minister was the economic policy maker in Britain, so what responsibility does he take for those failings here?
	I turn to the recession, about which the Prime Minister makes two claims. The first claim is that Britain's economic situation is all imported from abroad. He has said that it started in America so many times that it is starting to sound ridiculous. Can he answer this—[Hon. Members: "It's true."] If it is true, he is going to have to answer this question. If Britain is so well prepared, can he explain why the IMF believes that the British economy will shrink faster next year than any major economy in the world? Can he explain why the European Commission says that we face a deeper recession next year than anywhere in the EU except for Estonia and Latvia? Far from being well prepared, Britain faces a deep recession. Is that not why in the past few months our currency has fallen more sharply than any major currency and more sharply than ever before in our recent history?
	"A weak currency arises from a weak economy which in turn is the result of a weak Government"—
	 [Interruption.] I do not know why the hon. Gentleman is pointing at me; that was not my hon. Friend the Member for Tatton (Mr. Osborne) this week, but the Prime Minister when he was shadow Chancellor. As the hon. Gentleman was talking, I shall read the quote again. It says that
	"a weak currency arises from a weak economy which in turn is the result of a weak Government"—
	 [Interruption.] I am so pleased to have made the Prime Minister smile.
	The Prime Minister's second claim is that there is universal support for a fiscal stimulus paid for by additional borrowing. Yet of the 3,500 words in the G20 communiqué, just 21 were about the fiscal stimulus, and they included the condition that the stimulus should be "appropriate" and "conducive to fiscal sustainability". The real international consensus is that only the countries that have been fiscally responsible are best placed to act now. Is that not why the OECD recommended a fiscal stimulus for those countries that had consolidated their public finances? Is that not why the European Central Bank said that if a country has borrowed more than 3 per cent.—as we have done—it should not borrow even more? Even this weekend, what the head of the IMF actually said is that a fiscal stimulus should take place only
	"where it is possible...where you have some room concerning debt sustainability."
	How can our Government claim that our debt is sustainable when our borrowing this year, before the recession has properly started, is among the highest in the developed world, and when we have just spent £40 billion on a bank rescue?
	The Prime Minister keeps citing China, but China, like Spain, the Netherlands, and Australia—like half the OECD, in fact—has a budget surplus. In Britain, our Prime Minister used the good years to build up the biggest budget deficit in the industrialised world. Is that not why, in Britain, more discretionary borrowing now, without knowing where the money is coming from, is bound to mean higher taxes later? Is that not what the Employment Minister admitted last Tuesday? Is that not what the Chancellor admitted last Wednesday? Is that not what the Business Secretary, not known for admitting anything, admitted this morning, when he talked about
	"a medium term adjustment some years ahead"
	and a
	"structural adjustment later on".
	Translated into English, does that not mean higher taxes under Labour?
	Is it not the case that Labour's borrowing bombshell will soon become a tax bombshell? Let us be absolutely clear about what this means: borrowing £30 billion now will mean an income tax bill for the average earner of nearly £1,500 later. Everyone knows the Prime Minister is planning a Christmas tax giveaway, but tax cuts should be for life, not just for Christmas. We need real tax cuts, not Labour tax cons.
	Just two years ago, the Prime Minister said:
	"No political party will be trusted if it promises stability in one breath and unfunded tax cuts in the next".
	Let me remind him of what he said. He pledged solemnly:
	"To make unfunded promises, to play fast and loose with stability... is... something I will never do and the British people will not accept."
	So now that he has broken that promise—now that he is promising a borrowing bombshell—will he start his response by being straight with the British people? Will he admit that by borrowing more now, he will have to tax more later? Just for once in his life, can he give us a straight answer—do not his borrowing plans today mean higher taxes tomorrow?

Gordon Brown: Let me start with a quote from the Leader of the Opposition:
	"I always think Leaders of the Opposition have to be careful not to... talk down the economy. You know there are some strong fundamentals in the British economy and we should celebrate those and point them out."
	That was his position a few months ago. He has changed his position today. A week ago, he said he favoured borrowing out of the crisis. Now he is against it altogether. Even the Americans agree that the financial crisis started in America. As for the regulation of banks, mortgages and pensions, it was his financial competitiveness working party that recommended the deregulation of pensions and mortgages only some time ago.
	I have listened on many occasions to the Leader of the Opposition and to the shadow Chancellor, and I have come to the conclusion that they do not understand what is happening in the world economy. I do not think that the Leader of the Opposition realises that while last year, and in the last few months, the problem has been inflation—we have had inflation combined with a credit crunch—in the next year, the problem is deflation and the problem— [Interruption.] Inflation close to zero.
	The answer is, as everybody has said at this international conference, that we combine monetary policy with fiscal action so that we have the best impact on growth in the economy. The Conservative party seems to be the only party that is now standing against what is a consensus developing across Europe and across the world: unless we take the fiscal action that is necessary now, and help businesses and families now, we will be undoing any benefit that can come from monetary policy and cuts in interest rates. I hope that the Conservatives will think again.
	The right hon. Gentleman sometimes quotes Canada. The Prime Minister of Canada has just said, at the end of the meeting— [Interruption.] The Prime Minister—  [Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker: Order. I expect better from you, Mr. Soames, than shouting across the Chamber.  [Interruption.] Order. The hon. Gentleman should be setting a good example.

Gordon Brown: The Prime Minister of Canada said:
	"There's a view coming out of this meeting, very strongly I can tell you... that monetary policy alone will not be sufficient to take the global economy through this crisis. There will have to be fiscal action, and there will have to be additional fiscal action."
	That is what almost every country is now saying as a result of what is happening around the world. It is the Conservative party that is out of touch. Then, there is Mr. Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, who said:
	"What countries do you think should have it?"—
	that is, the fiscal stimulus.
	"I want to answer your question candidly. Everywhere where it's possible. Everywhere where you have some room concerning debt sustainability. Everywhere where inflation is low enough not to risk having some kind of return of inflation, this effort has to be made."
	Let us also be clear about debt comparisons: France 55 per cent. of GDP; Germany 56 per cent.; Italy 101 per cent.; Japan 94 per cent.; the USA 46 per cent; the United Kingdom 37 per cent.
	The Opposition have been wrong on every single matter concerning this downturn: they were wrong to oppose the nationalisation of Northern Rock; they were wrong to say that we should not act against shares speculation; they were wrong to say that we could not cut interest rates because the fiscal position was in a bad state; they were wrong to say on Sunday that we could not persuade the rest of the world of the need for a fiscal stimulus; they were wrong with their fuel duty stabiliser that would put fuel duty up by 5p now; they were wrong with the employment policy last week, which was dismissed by the Small Business Federation not as an incentive to employment but, after spending £2.5 billion, as a disincentive to employment. They have been wrong on every single occasion when they have turned their minds to economic policy. They are not only outside the national consensus, but outside the international consensus as well.
	What, then, is the answer of the Leader of the Opposition? It is to bring back the right hon. Member for West Dorset (Mr. Letwin). That is what he means by "time for a change". Everyone is tested by the economic circumstances we face: Governments are tested and Oppositions are tested. This Opposition have been tested and found wanting.

Nicholas Clegg: I would like to add my own expressions of sympathy and condolence to the— [Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker: Order. Mr. Luff, you should calm down— [Interruption.] Order. The hon. Gentleman should calm himself, or is he telling me that I am not chairing the proceedings properly? I do not think that he would want to do that.

Nicholas Clegg: I would like to add my own expressions of sympathy and condolence to the family and friends of Colour Sergeant Dura and Marines Neil Dunstan and Robert McKibben who tragically lost their lives in Afghanistan this week.
	I thank the Prime Minister for his statement. I, too, think that it was good that this was a G20 summit, which included new powers such as India, China, Brazil and others. I hope that that will be a precedent for the future because global governance can no longer be a stitch-up of the old powers alone.
	I also strongly agree with the Prime Minister's words on the danger of protectionism. The lesson from the 1930s is indeed that narrow nationalism and trade barriers will only make matters worse. Speaking as one who was at the inception of the Doha development round in 2001, I feel strongly that we must seek to trade our way out of this recession.
	British exports, of course, will be boosted after the recent fall in the value of the pound after a long period of over-valuation. In my opinion, the shadow Chancellor was well within his own rights to talk about the falling pound, even if he made almost no sense at all. Does the Prime Minister agree that this sudden desire for currency stability is a bizarre U-turn from a party that once referred to the euro as a "toilet paper currency"?
	The Prime Minister spoke a great deal today about a fiscal stimulus, and it is rumoured that he wants to borrow money for a temporary tax rebate. In my view, it is right to give money back to people on low and middle incomes who are more likely to spend some of that money, but instead of borrowing for a one-off tax cut, the Prime Minister could pay for a big permanent tax cut by ending unfair loopholes for the very wealthy. Would not that be fair? The right thing to borrow for is not short-term cash bribes, but long-term capital investment in infrastructure which the country needs in any case. Does he agree that extra borrowing can be justified only to fund green energy, sustainable transport and the homes we need for a sustainable economic recovery?
	The Prime Minister still seems incapable of differentiating between good public spending and bad public spending. Why in the teeth of this recession, does he still want to waste £13 billion of the public's money on an NHS computer system that will not work, £12 billion of it on a surveillance database that no one wants and £5 billion on ID cards that no one needs?
	I know that in the past the Prime Minister has struggled to distinguish between cutting public spending and redirecting it as we want, but does he now accept that my party's plans to redirect wasteful spending to things that people really need in a recession—such as homes, child care, education, training and fairer taxes—are the right thing to do?
	The Prime Minister has spent several weeks jetting around the world. Will he now focus on three key steps that will help people here at home: permanent fairer taxes, borrowing only for long-term investment, and redirecting public spending towards the things that people really need in a recession?

Gordon Brown: The first thing that I should say to the right hon. Gentleman is that it is important that we do not cut capital investment at this time. The capital investment that we are making in homes, education, the health service and the environmental technologies of this country is capital investment that we will continue. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will be able to support us when we say that it would be totally wrong, at a time when we are preparing for the next stage of the world economy, to cut capital investment in those areas.
	I must also say to the right hon. Gentleman that we have removed tax loopholes in every Budget since 1997, including the loopholes removed by the Chancellor in the last Budget. I see no evidence from my reading of the Liberal Democrats' policy document that they can find the billions that they say are to be found in the cutting of tax loopholes, and I believe that, when subjected to rigorous examination, their policy once again does not stand up.
	I have to tell the right hon. Gentleman that if he cuts public expenditure and says that that constitutes savings, as he is doing, he is still cutting public expenditure by £20 billion.

Adrian Bailey: I welcome my right hon. Friend's statement, and particularly welcome the international backing for the actions that he has taken. I think we all recognise that he has a difficult task to perform in ensuring that sustained public expenditure maintains our economy at an appropriate level and, at the same time, helps hard-working families. Can he assure me that he will resist the siren voices on the Opposition Benches calling for the introduction of a fuel duty stabiliser?

Gordon Brown: In the heat of the summer, to gain a bit of publicity, the shadow Chancellor announced that he had a fuel duty stabiliser. The problem with the fuel duty stabiliser is that the minute petrol prices fell to 97p a litre, the right hon. Gentleman would have been bound to put the price up by 5p a litre. I do not think that, even with his bluster, he can deny that that is the case.
	This is just one of the Conservative ideas that were launched in the morning, were found wanting in the afternoon, and are never talked about now. The right hon. Gentleman had exactly the same problem with his proposed employment measures last week. His proposal to spend £2.5 billion on employment, one of the biggest outlays of public expenditure, was rejected by the Federation of Small Businesses as a disincentive. I think that the Conservatives will have to go back to the drawing board, but I do not think that the right hon. Member for West Dorset (Mr. Letwin), who lost them the 2001 and 2005 elections, will be of much help to them.

Kenneth Clarke: Will the Prime Minister not confess that he went to the summit to obtain cover for the short-term borrowing on which he intends to embark as much for electoral as for economic reasons? Does he not accept that the summit statement stresses debt sustainability, which he noticeably omitted from all his own statements, and that if he goes ahead with adding to the level of debt that will, I hope, be revealed in full next Monday, he will merely build up impossible problems for the Government who must follow, and must sort out the mess that he has created over the 10 years of his stewardship?

Gordon Brown: When the right hon. and learned Gentleman was Chancellor, debt was 44 per cent. of GDP. At the moment, according to the IMF, it is 37 per cent. of GDP. That is debt sustainability: it means that we can build on a level of debt that is lower than the 1997 level to take the action that is necessary.
	I went to the summit because, unlike the Conservatives, I believe that co-ordinated international action is possible. I believe that we can work with the rest of Europe and the rest of the world to take specific and decisive action to deal with the financial crisis, and I believe that we can work together not just on financial sector reform but on fiscal policy.
	Despite saying a few weeks ago that borrowing was necessary, the Leader of the Opposition has today set his face against the fiscal stimulus that is necessary in this economy and other economies. He will find himself outnumbered by every major country in the world. He will find that America will have a fiscal stimulus in the next few months; he will find that the rest of the European Union will also agree to a fiscal stimulus; and he will find that the rest of the world will want that to happen. But if the Conservative party has not woken up to the fact that we have near-to-zero inflation coming up next year, and that fiscal stimulus is the necessary way in which to get around it, I do not think that the party will ever begin to understand the modern economy.

Frank Dobson: Will my right hon. Friend stick to the policies he has been outlining and give the fiscal stimulus that is necessary, and ignore the juvenile approach of those on the Tory Front Bench, whose Members apparently believe that borrowing is all right for bailing out bankers, but that when it is intended to make sure that people and small businesses all over the country have jobs and stay in business it is not acceptable?

Gordon Brown: Yes, if we had taken the Conservative party's advice, the price of petrol would be going up by 5p per litre. It cannot deny that; that is the policy it announced a few months ago. Is this the right time for us to be increasing the price of petrol by imposing a 5p per litre rise? That is the Opposition's policy, and it would harm people at this time. The Conservatives seem to be unable to understand that if inflation is falling substantially and there is a downturn and a credit crunch, we need the power of Government action to give a fiscal stimulus to the economy. I suspect that, under the influence of the right hon. Member for West Dorset, the Conservatives are lurching back to a monetarist policy such as that which failed in the past.

Angus Robertson: I welcome the G20 declaration, especially the section stating that its
	"work will be guided by a shared belief"
	in
	"economic growth, employment, and poverty reduction."
	Given that tens of thousands of people employed in the financial sector around the UK are fearing for their jobs, not least in HBOS, is the Prime Minister confident that mistakes in regulation are not now being repeated with the abandonment of competition rules?

Gordon Brown: The hon. Gentleman opposes the action we took on competition rules in relation to HBOS and Lloyds TSB, but if we had not taken that action HBOS would have collapsed as a banking institution. The idea that the Scottish National party is putting around Scotland about HBOS being basically a healthy institution that came under fire because of London speculators is complete nonsense. It had a bad business model and it lost a great deal of money because of that bad business model. That has to be corrected, which is why Lloyds TSB has been given the support of Government with the share issue for the new HBOS-Lloyds TSB. The hon. Gentleman should stop peddling myths around Scotland about the viability of HBOS in its present form.

Peter Hain: Will the Prime Minister ignore the bumbling opportunism of "boy George" and the Conservatives, and instead learn the lessons from Keynes that they have clearly failed to learn, by recognising that to avoid a 1930s-type slump it is necessary to borrow to invest and to cut taxes of the kind he is advocating? The alternative advocated by the Conservatives would result in a prolonged slump in Britain.

Gordon Brown: I fear that the shadow Chancellor said on Sunday:
	"Gordon Brown told us before going to Washington that it was all about getting a global agreement for a fiscal stimulus package. He has not done that."
	How out of touch are the Opposition.

John Butterfill: Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the trigger for all of this was a catastrophic failure of regulation of the financial services sector in the United States, but does he also agree that as London had become the world financial centre, it had an even greater need for competent regulation of the financial sector, and that the regulatory regime he put in place has failed abysmally?

Gordon Brown: First, I am pleased that the hon. Gentleman has acknowledged what the Leader of the Opposition has failed to understand: that the problems started in the United States of America. As long as the Conservatives do not understand how the problem started, they will never begin to understand how to solve it. When even the Americans agree that the problem started in America, it ill befits the Leader of the Opposition to try to mislead people about how the problem started. On regulation, we created the Financial Services Authority; we brought together all the different regulators to do so. The only policy the Conservative party has put forward on regulation in the last year or two is a policy to deregulate pensions, mortgages and the financial system. It should be ashamed of that policy.

Iain Duncan Smith: The Prime Minister may recall that when he was in opposition he used to say that the strength of a currency was a reflection of the strength of its economy. Notwithstanding the fact that the world is going into recession, does he not think that the precipitant fall in sterling is down to the fact that the international community believes that we enter this recession in a worse state than almost anybody else?

Gordon Brown: First, I think that the former Leader of the Opposition should think twice about what he says about the currency at this stage. I have never, whether in opposition or government, given a running commentary on the currency, as the Opposition seem to want to do. I think that it is highly irresponsible for them to do that in the present circumstances. May I say that, in 1989, Lady Thatcher complained —[Interruption.] They have no respect, even when it comes to listening to the words of Lady Thatcher now. She complained of people
	"trying to help the speculators and talks sterling down in the most unBritish way."—[ Official Report, 15 June 1989; Vol. 154, c. 1119.]

Kevin Barron: Can my right hon. Friend assure the House that any fiscal action he takes in the next few weeks will be to fight the problems that our constituents face, whether on homes and mortgages or in the workplace, and not fight the next general election?

Gordon Brown: We are trying to help people in difficult situations with their mortgages. That is why we are bringing in changes from 1 January to help people who are unemployed pay for their mortgages. We are trying to speed up social housing provision, so that we can replace the loss of private house building in the economy. On jobs, my right hon. Friend will note that we have enhanced the new deal that is available to help people moving from one job to another, and we have enhanced the ability to launch a rapid response in communities that are facing redundancies—that is how to help people in difficult situations. The way ahead is not to abolish the new deal, as the Opposition would do, but to enhance it.

Daniel Rogerson: As the Prime Minister considers his approach to dealing with all these issues, will he instruct Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs to be as sympathetic as possible to those employers who are temporarily experiencing problems with cash flow, in the hope that jobs that will be crucial to the future recovery of the economy can be safeguarded for the future?

Gordon Brown: That is what we would try to do in these circumstances, and I assure the hon. Gentleman that HMRC will do what it can.

Stuart Bell: Relative to the fiscal stimuli throughout Europe, is it not a fact that Germany is in recession, the eurozone is in recession and, come January, the United States may be in recession? Following on from the point made by the Leader of the Opposition, may I say that even the G20's communiqué referred to fiscal stimulus? Should that fiscal stimulus cover tax cuts, interest rate cuts above the 2 per cent. and spending plans, such as those for Crossrail? Is that not what the British people wish—or do they wish for the woeful and curmudgeonly approach of the Opposition?

Gordon Brown: I am surprised that the Opposition think that they have such genius that they can stand out against the opinion that is being expressed by right-wing and left-wing Governments and right-wing and left-wing economists. If the Opposition put themselves in a situation in which, facing a world downturn and the prospect of inflation reducing—as it will over the next year—and when we have interest rate cuts, they are unprepared to use the fiscal weapon, people will believe, as they will then conclude, that the Conservatives see no role for government in sorting out those problems. That is a big mistake that the Conservative party is making.

Peter Tapsell: May I assure the Prime Minister, putting aside for one moment his heavy personal responsibility for the very serious situation in which we find ourselves, that I think he is right to continue here in Britain the overdue reduction in interest rates—as I am sure he intends to do—to boost consumer demand, which I hope will be done by a serious cut in VAT, and to increase investment in public works? More controversially on the Conservative Benches, and speaking as a Keynesian, may I say that he is right to fund that by further borrowing and to watch, as I am sure he hopes to do, the next two Governments trying to pay off the bills from an office in the International Monetary Fund?

Gordon Brown: Here we have a voice from the Conservative party saying that there should be a fiscal stimulus—[ Interruption.] The Leader of the Opposition suggests that the hon. Member for Louth and Horncastle (Sir Peter Tapsell) was joking, but I think that he was serious. He wants to see a fiscal stimulus because he understands what Conservative Front Benchers have decided they do not want to understand—that fiscal action is necessary in the circumstances that we face. Indeed, two weeks ago the Leader of the Opposition said that there had to be more borrowing: now he says that there should not be more borrowing. The Opposition cannot make up their mind in any given circumstances. The only change they represent is that they change their mind every week.

Nigel Griffiths: Will my right hon. Friend take no lessons from those who talk the pound down today and who sent the pound down 16 years ago with a disastrous exit from the exchange rate mechanism, which caused a record number of bankruptcies, a record number of people losing their homes, and record unemployment? Some people never learn.

Gordon Brown: I hope that the Opposition will reflect on what they have said about sterling. It is one thing to get a cheap and quick headline: it is another thing to take responsible action on behalf of the British economy. These are the people who said at their party conference, when they were in another particular predicament, that they would work with the Government and we would have all-party agreement on economic policy—[ Interruption.] Does the Leader of the Opposition deny saying that? That is what they said then, but now they want to change their mind every week on policy, simply to get a headline. As one of their documents said a few days ago, the most important thing is getting a headline and it does not really matter what is said.

Michael Spicer: Why has the pound collapsed? That is a perfectly reasonable question to ask a Prime Minister.

Gordon Brown: A year ago, the dollar was at a low level. This year, the pound is at a lower level. Currencies change—[ Interruption.] If Conservatives want to give a running commentary on sterling, they are not even responsible enough to be in opposition.

Sally Keeble: I welcome my right hon. Friend's commitment to the introduction of international regulation for the credit ratings agencies next March. However, I urge him not to listen to the Opposition about light-touch, or even no-touch regulation, and ensure that the proposals are robust and provide real confidence for institutions and individual investors.

Gordon Brown: We will do that, and the policy to be set out by the Chancellor will ensure that.

Michael Fallon: Is it not often the case that in a major conflagration the arsonist is spotted in the crowd watching the fire brigade at work? Does the Prime Minister still not accept any responsibility for the fact that five of our 10 biggest banks were allowed to over-lend under a system of supervision that he set up, and that the public finances were hopelessly over-borrowed under his chancellorship?

Gordon Brown: This is the Conservative party that was saying a few months ago that it wanted less regulation in our banking system. This is the Conservative party that produced a document saying that it was time for deregulation of mortgages. This is the Conservative party that cannot now claim that it has the answers to a crisis that it has no idea what to do about.

Doug Henderson: My right hon. Friend will know that Members' memories tend to be very short. Perhaps he can jog our memories and tell us whether any one of the leaders at the conference suggested that they thought that it was inappropriate to borrow to provide a fiscal stimulus in their country or in any other country of the G20.

Gordon Brown: My hon. Friend is absolutely right: a consensus is developing across the world. The G20 is a group of emerging markets and developed countries. It represents every continent in the world and a consensus is developing, from China to the US, to Canada, across Europe and over to Asia, that the way through this period of unique circumstances—a downturn, a credit crunch and falling inflation—is a fiscal stimulus. I do not think that, on reflection, many Conservatives would disagree. This is the right thing to do, and I hope that they will go back to the drawing board and think again.

John Redwood: Why did the Prime Minister ignore the strong advice that we gave him in the economic policy review, which he often quotes, to give powers back to the Bank of England and to concentrate regulation on capital adequacy because there was a credit boom under way? He should not in any way imply that we were ignorant of that fact. We warned him before Northern Rock went down, and if he had taken our advice we would not have had to nationalise a single bank.

Gordon Brown: Because in his document he said that it was time to deregulate the mortgage market. He must face up to the fact that that was his recommendation.

Derek Wyatt: My constituents understand that doing nothing is not an option. They know what a depression is because they lived through one 18 years ago, and so they welcome intervention in the market. When my right hon. Friend chairs the G20, does he intend eventually to wrap the G8 into the G20? If the G20 is to become a financial regulator, what will happen to the IMF and the World Bank?

Gordon Brown: The reform of the international institutions that include the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the G8 and the G20 will be very much the subject of discussion at the next meeting of the G20. We have put forward our proposals for reform and other countries will put forward theirs. I believe that we will come to recognise that in the new world economy decisions cannot be made about the future unless the Asian countries and a wider spectrum of representation are included in discussions about the big macro-economic decisions. That is why I think that there will be general agreement about the need for change and I hope, on this occasion, that we will have support from all parties in the House when that change happens.

John Maples: The Chancellor, I mean the Prime Minister—he is doing both jobs, I think—is talking as though the economy is not already receiving a huge fiscal boost. The Government will run a deficit this year of £50 billion or £60 billion. If we add all those American banks that went wrong, such as Northern Rock and Halifax Bank of Scotland, it must come to well over £100 billion. The recession has to take its course— [ Interruption. ] Just listen. Bad debts have to be written off, bad investments have to be written off and people and businesses need to repair their balance sheets. The Prime Minister knows that, even if some of his Back Benchers do not. If that does not happen, there will not be a solid base for recovery. He risks endangering that base for recovery with a massive increase in Government borrowing that will leave a legacy of debt and taxes into the future.

Gordon Brown: Now we have a new position from the Conservative party, which I think people will reflect on: the recession has to take its course and nothing can be done about it. We have heard three positions from the Conservative party: the hon. Member for Louth and Horncastle (Sir Peter Tapsell) says that there has to be fiscal action; the hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Mr. Maples) says that nothing can be done; and those on the Front Bench are dreaming up initiatives every day, all of which fail before they even reach the scrutiny of the afternoon. The Conservative party will have to think about whether it has a responsible economic policy at all.

Clive Efford: I congratulate my right hon. Friend on the leadership that he has shown in trying to deal with this worldwide economic crisis. Will he tell the House whether anyone was prepared to argue the case for deregulation at the G20 summit? Is there anybody of any note, other than the Opposition, who is arguing that line?

Gordon Brown: Well, because the Conservative Front Bench was not represented at the G20 conference, nobody was arguing the case for deregulation. I suspect that if Conservative Front Benchers continue to argue the case for deregulation, they will not be at any other conference for a very long time.
	The Conservative party wants to deny the truth that this was a downturn started in America with the financial sector problems, as acknowledged by one Conservative Member, the hon. Member for Bournemouth, West (Sir John Butterfill) and that it cannot be sorted out by national action alone and needs international action, including that action within Europe that the Conservative party would not support. The international downturn needs monetary policy to be allied to fiscal action, and the Conservative party cannot contemplate that. On every major issue it is out of touch not just with national opinion but with international opinion, too.

Alistair Burt: The G20 will no doubt have considered how to restore public confidence in political and financial institutions and how to reassure the public that they are not simply being offered a false prospectus of jam today and pain tomorrow. In view of that, and bearing in mind the pain and trouble that has already been caused, will the Prime Minister assure us that he is leading international consensus to ban from use anywhere the phrase, "No return to boom and bust"?

Gordon Brown: This country had 10 years of economic growth under a Labour Government and 3 million more jobs—something the Conservative party never achieved. Given that we now know that the Conservative party does not even have a policy to deal with the downturn, people will understand that they are better off with the leadership they have.

Laura Moffatt: Many people around the world know that the measures being taken today are to defend their jobs and ensure that they have a future. For small businesses in the UK, that is incredibly important, so will my right hon. Friend in his leadership of the G20 take to them the message that small businesses in the UK and around the world are the backbone of our economies and need to be supported? What will he do to support them around the world?

Gordon Brown: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Working with small businesses in her constituency, she does a great deal to promote the local economy. Interest rates have come down to 3 per cent., which will help small businesses. Having recapitalised the banks we have to persuade them that it is necessary to lend, and to remove the aversion to risk that exists in many banking institutions. Those who have been recapitalised by the Government signed up to stringent procedures—that they will make capital available for small businesses at 2007 levels—and we intend to work with them to ensure that happens. I hope that there will be all-party support for these things, but I am afraid that we cannot see it in the Conservative party today.

Ann Winterton: Can the Prime Minister confirm whether the mark to market rule was discussed at the summit?

Gordon Brown: We are looking at that very issue through the Financial Stability Forum and it will be one of the issues addressed in the report on 31 March.

Gordon Prentice: My friend mentioned tax havens. Is there anything we can do unilaterally or perhaps at EU level, or must it await multilateral action?

Gordon Brown: I believe there is now a genuine desire for international action to deal with the problems of offshore centres that do not respond to the normal regulatory rules that exist in the rest of the world. We can see from the communiqué that there is a determination to take action where it is necessary. Again, that is one of the subjects for debate after the recommendations on 31 March.

William Cash: The Prime Minister noticeably did not answer the question that was just put about action at EU level. He answered only in the international context. During the statement, he repeatedly used the word "co-ordination" when in fact the declaration on the summit repeatedly uses the word "co-operation". He knows perfectly well what the difference is—at least I think he does—so will he please tell us?

Gordon Brown: I am referring to the statement made after the summit by the President of the European Union, President Sarkozy, when he called for concerted action and coordination. There is general agreement that Europe must work together to deal with these problems. Unfortunately, the policy that I think the Conservative party is trying to put forward is a rigid form of the growth and stability pact. The Conservatives oppose it in Europe but seem to want to apply it in Britain.

Kerry McCarthy: Is it not the case that in previous recessions the bulk of Government borrowing had to go on funding a massive bill for unemployment benefit? Will my right hon. Friend join me in rejecting the Pontius Pilate approach of Opposition Members who want to wash their hands of responsibility for tackling the problems, and will he make sure that we have fiscal stimulus that will protect our constituents from the misery that mass unemployment would cause?

Gordon Brown: Last week, the Conservative party announced a proposal for employment that would cut employers' national insurance and spend £2.5 billion on it. It was immediately— [ Interruption. ] The right hon. Gentleman says he knows that we have been looking at it. It was immediately rejected by the chambers of commerce and by the national Federation of Small Businesses because as usual— [ Interruption. ] The CBI welcomed it, but it was designed to help small businesses and the national Federation of Small Businesses says not only that it is a bad policy but that it would be counter-productive. The Conservatives spent £2.5 billion on that great initiative and got all their figures wrong as usual. It was confused, contradictory and ill thought out, and I predict we will not hear much about it from the Conservatives again.

Brian Binley: The Prime Minister talks about jobs in this country, yet over 11 years he has added £66 billion to the burden for businesses in this country through regulation and additional costs. That is the burden that business is facing and that is what he can do something about, but he fails to do so. I challenge him today not to go ahead with the 1 per cent. increase in corporation tax due to come into effect next April, on the basis that business needs all the money it can get to protect the jobs it is providing at this very moment.

Gordon Brown: When we came to power, corporation tax was 33 per cent.; it is now 28 per cent. I fear that the hon. Gentleman is reading from the old script when he complains about regulation. I think that everybody understands the necessity for regulation in the financial sector to protect small businesses and savers.

Andrew Miller: Did my right hon. Friend have any discussions in the United States with his colleagues about the motor vehicle industry? Does he agree that we need sustained investment in that industry, particularly in newer technologies? That will have a much more positive effect than talking down the economy, which is what some people believe in doing.

Gordon Brown: That is why we have already made available additional money for investment in new technology for cars, to allow different motor manufacturers to adapt to new technology.

Graham Stuart: Car tax?

Gordon Brown: Conservative Members ask about car tax; if they had their way, they would put up fuel duty by 5p in the pound. That is the Conservatives' policy for fuel duty. That is what they call the fuel duty stabiliser. It would mean an extra 5p, and they cannot deny that that is their policy.

David Curry: The Prime Minister will know that interest rates are a double-edged sword, because low interest rates mean cuts in the value of savings, of pension funds, and of annuity rates. In his pre-Budget statement, will he take action to help at least elderly people, who may be the most vulnerable, by suspending the present annuity rules that can lock people into a punishingly low rate of return as they grow older?

Gordon Brown: There is more than one alternative for pensioners at the age at which the question of an annuity arises, but I have to say to the right hon. Gentleman that as far as pensioners are concerned, the winter allowance is going up to £250 for all households of people over 60, and to £400 for households of people over 80. We recognise that for the vast majority of pensioners, the issue is their heating bills over the winter months. That is why we have raised the winter allowance.

Points of Order

Graham Stuart: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. For Opposition Back Benchers, today felt like a particularly poor day in the history of shameless failures to answer questions. May I ask—

Mr. Speaker: Order. I am not going to extend the statement. As for the word "shameless", we should try to use temperate language when discussing such matters.

Peter Bone: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. It is helpful for Back-Bench Members to have a copy of a Minister's statement once the Minister has made it. On this occasion, copies of the statement quickly went around the Government Benches, but they were very late arriving on my Bench, and that makes things a little difficult for Back Benchers.

Mr. Speaker: I will look into the matter, and I thank the hon. Gentleman for drawing it to my attention.

Education and Skills Bill  [Ways and Means]

Motion made, and Question proposed,
	That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Education and Skills Bill, it is expedient to authorise the charging of fees in respect of inspections by Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Education, Children's Services and Skills of independent educational institutions.— [Jim Knight.]

Nick Gibb: The Minister for Schools and Learners gave a disappointingly short introduction to the motion. I hope that he will have a chance to explain the motion to the House. It relates to the fee-charging provisions in what is now clause 97, which enables Ofsted to charge fees for inspections of schools in the independent sector. The explanatory note to the Bill as originally drafted says:
	"The Government intends to use the power...to set fees for inspections that are no higher than is necessary to recover some or all of the costs associated with the inspections."
	As the fee recovers costs and no more, there was no need for a Ways and Means motion to be passed by the House. The memorandum of delegated powers, which the Government published at the same time as the Bill, said that the clause
	"extends the power currently contained in s164(9) of the Education Act 2002 to require payment of inspection fees."
	The aim of the power is to limit the burden of inspection of independent education institutions on the public purse. Lords amendments Nos. 81 and 151, passed in another place, went further than that: they changed the wording of the clause so that it is now possible for the fees charged to exceed the cost of the inspection. That potentially changes the nature of the fee so that it is closer to a tax. That, of course, is why a Ways and Means motion is now necessary.
	Lord Adonis was uncharacteristically opaque about the reasons for these changes when he introduced the amendments in another place, saying merely that they
	"ensure that the Government's policy in relation to the setting of inspection fees...can be implemented."—[ Official Report, House of Lords, 21 July 2008; Vol. 703, c. 1600.]
	Can the Minister confirm whether the statement in the original explanatory notes that the fees will be
	"no higher than is necessary to recover some or all of the costs associated with the inspections"
	is still true? If it is no longer true, why is he using these fee-charging provisions as a way of raising revenue or cross-subsidising other aspects of Ofsted's work? If, in his view, it is still true, why does he think that this Ways and Means motion is necessary?

Jim Knight: The motion in the name of my right hon. Friend the Financial Secretary to the Treasury is necessary in order to take forward the purpose of clause 97, which is to allow inspection fees to be paid annually and in advance of inspections carried out by the chief inspector. It carries forward and extends provisions already in place in the existing legislation.
	As the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb) said, amendment No. 81 will enable the Government to carry out their stated policy aims in relation to fees for the inspection of independent educational institutions. I think that this is the explanation that he is after. We propose that an annual inspection fee will be paid by all independent educational institutions, which will spread the cost of an inspection every three years, and that fees may be charged in advance of the inspection. One or more fees may be charged in relation to an individual inspection. That will allow for a fee to be paid each year where an inspection takes place every three years. This approach replaces the inspection fee system whereby schools were expected to pay their fee either in a lump sum immediately after inspection or in two instalments. Allowing institutions to spread the cost will help small institutions and those with limited budgets who may struggle to pay under the current system.
	The annual fee, which we expect to be paid in October each year, will be calculated on the basis of the head count contained in the preceding annual return. Pupil numbers may fluctuate upwards or downwards, which means that in some cases the cost of the inspection may not reflect the fee paid. However, fees will be recalculated every October to take account of the latest available pupil numbers taken from the January annual return. That will minimise any under-charging or over-charging. In effect, the explanatory notes are right, but there is that small margin for error. It would not be practical to look at pupil numbers more than once a year for the purposes of setting that year's annual fee, as the January annual return is the only source of pupil numbers. I know that the hon. Gentleman is a great champion of reducing burdens on independent schools.

Kelvin Hopkins: Does my right hon. Friend agree that independent schools already get a very generous subsidy from the taxpayer through tax benefits arising from their charitable status?

Jim Knight: My hon. Friend must be careful to be fully cognisant of the whole range of independent schools, not only those that might be members of the Independent Schools Council, for example. The Charity Commission is ensuring that independent schools that have charitable status are earning it, and I am happy to see the difference that the new head of the commission is making in that regard.
	There may also be a very small number of cases in which an institution, having paid fees in advance, closes before the periodic inspection takes place. Amendment No. 81 contains a power that will allow fees paid in such cases not to be refunded. This policy is to prevent institutions from exploiting the system by temporarily closing before an inspection is due. If refunds were made, institutions could then apply to re-register and pay only the initial registration fee, which we propose would be £500. In the majority of cases, that sum would be considerably lower than the fees refunded. There would be nothing to stop an institution continuing to exploit the system indefinitely if refunds were allowed.
	I should reiterate that overall we intend to use the powers in order to set fees that are no higher than is necessary to recover some or all of the costs associated with inspections. I hope that with that clarification the House will be happy to approve the motion.
	 Question put and agreed to.

Education and Skills Bill (Programme) (No. 3)

Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 83A (Programme motions),
	That the following provisions shall apply to the Education and Skills Bill for the purpose of supplementing the Orders of 14th January and 13th May 2008 (Education and Skills Bill (Programme) and Education and Skills Bill (Programme) (No. 2)):
	 Consideration of Lords Amendments
	1. Proceedings on consideration of Lords Amendments shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion at the moment of interruption at this day's sitting.
	 Subsequent stages
	2. Any further Message from the Lords may be considered forthwith without any Question being put.
	3. The proceedings on any further Message from the Lords shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion one hour after their commencement. —[Steve McCabe.]
	 Question agreed to.

Orders of the Day

Education and Skills Bill

Lords amendments considered.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: I draw the House's attention to the fact that privilege is involved in Lords amendments Nos. 1 to 23, 28, 32, 40, 81 and 151. If the House agrees to any of these Lords amendments, I shall ensure that the appropriate entry is made in the Journal.

Clause 22
	 — 
	Financial penalty for contravention of section 21

Lords amendment: No. 1.

Jim Knight: I beg to move, That this House agrees with the Lords in the said amendment.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: With this it will be convenient to discuss Lords amendments Nos. 2 to 23, 33 to 39, 174 to 177 and 191.

Jim Knight: I would like to speak first to amendments Nos. 1 to 23, and 38. I welcome the careful scrutiny that the Select Committee on the Constitution gave to the Bill. I also welcome the Committee's detailed and helpful comments on duties on employers, related sanctions and rights of objection and appeal. The enforcement powers that local authorities have in relation to employers will be used only as a last resort, and would always be preceded by informal engagement with the employer. We will also consult employer organisations to develop clear guidance for employers to ensure that they fully understand what is expected and do not risk facing enforcement action. However, should enforcement provisions need to be used, the Government agree it is important to be absolutely clear that employers have rights of objection and appeal. These amendments ensure that this is the case.
	Amendments Nos. 174 and 176 give effect to one of the recommendations of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee. They ensure that any regulations setting the amount of the financial penalty that a local authority can impose on an employer who has failed to comply with their duties would be subject to the affirmative procedure, except where those regulations reduce the amount of the penalty. The Committee recommended that the affirmative procedure would be needed only for the first use of the regulation-making power, and for any subsequent regulations that raised the amount of the penalty by more than inflation. However, as it proved difficult to link the provisions to inflation in this way, we have gone beyond the Committee's recommendation and proposed the affirmative procedure for every use of these regulations, except where they reduce the amount. I am grateful to the Committee for its careful scrutiny and constructive recommendations.
	Amendments Nos. 33 and 34 clarify that the duties on employers in chapter 3 apply in relation to employment in this House and in the other place. It is right that that employment should count for the purposes of the duty to participate, and that the duties to check that a young person is in education or training and release them to attend should apply, to ensure that young people can participate in the necessary learning. But, as is the custom, it would not be appropriate for local authorities to have powers of enforcement against this House or the other place, so the amendments clarify that the provisions in chapter 3 relating to enforcement do not apply. Amendment No. 35 is a consequence of the previous amendments, and the relevant definition is included in the new clause and can therefore be deleted from this one.
	Amendments Nos. 36 and 37 are minor and technical amendments to aid interpretation of the Bill. Amendment No. 36 replaces the definition of a member of the House of Commons staff in the Bill with a reference to the existing definition in the Employment Rights Act 1996, and amendment No. 37 makes provision for who is to be treated as the employer in relation to House of Commons staff.
	We discussed questions relating to Wales on Report in this House, and my hon. Friend the Member for Ogmore (Huw Irranca-Davies), the then Under-Secretary of State for Wales, committed that we would
	"ensure that the Bill is drafted in such a way that it enables all aspects of the policy to be capable of application in Wales in future".—[ Official Report, 13 May 2008; Vol. 475, c. 1287.]
	My hon. Friend now occupies the office that I used to occupy in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs—and it a very comfortable one. I am pleased to see my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Mr. David), the new Under-Secretary of State for Wales, in his place. I take this opportunity to congratulate him.
	Amendments Nos. 39, 175, 177, and 191 enable the duties on employers in chapter 3 of part 1 to be applied to Wales in future, should the Assembly Government, having studied the impact of the legislation in England, decide to acquire the legislative competence to raise the participation age in Wales and bring forward a measure to do so. We think it important that duties on employers on either side of the border should be the same if the participation age is the same, so that the system is easy to understand and potential burdens on employers are minimised. The amendments ensure that should the participation age be raised in Wales, and should the Secretary of State use his power to apply the provisions in chapter 3 to Wales, any order he made would be subject to the affirmative procedure, and that Welsh Ministers would need to be consulted first.
	I hope that hon. Members will agree that this group of fairly technical amendments improves the Bill, and I commend the amendments to the House.

Nick Gibb: I am grateful to the Minister for that clear explanation of the group of Lords amendments. He cited the House of Lords Select Committee on the Constitution, but I do not believe that he mentioned the letter of 11 June from my noble Friend Lord Goodlad.
	Given that Lord Goodlad was a former Chief Whip in this House, I was already convinced that everything he said in that letter was true. However, I was even more convinced once I had read it. Lord Goodlad makes the important point of principle that
	"where the executive branch of government is given powers to impose penalties, minimum standards of administrative justice should be in place to safeguard people from wrongful impositions of demands for compliance or payment of financial penalties (whether because of a factual mistake or legal error on the part of the public authority). "
	He refers to the common law principle of audi alteram partem. As one of the last generation of state-educated pupils to learn Latin, I can tell the Minister that that means "Hear the other side." It leads Lord Goodlad to ask why the Bill contains no express obligation to hear the employer's side of events before a compliance or penalty notice is imposed. He goes on to ask, in English, why the Bill contains no express provision for reviewing enforcement and penalty notices.
	The next matter of concern that my noble Friend raised relates to appeals. He said:
	"In situations where an executive branch of government is empowered to impose sanctions, especially financial penalties, it is of great importance that accused persons have access to an independent court to question the legality of a penalty."
	Lord Adonis, in his response of 1 July, replied that, as the fine would be a civil penalty, recoverable through the county court, the employer would have the opportunity to put his case and effectively provide an appeal. However, Lord Goodlad said:
	"We believe that as a matter of principle there ought to be express provision for an appeal to enable the person subject to a penalty to challenge the factual and legal basis on which the penalty has been imposed."
	He went on to cite the express appeals provision in clause 39 of the Pensions Bill, which creates a right of appeal to a tribunal.
	Lord Adonis's response was:
	"We did not think it desirable to provide for rights of appeal because this would mean establishing a new body to hear such appeals. Unlike the Pensions Bill where there is a natural body to hear appeals (the Pensions Regulator Tribunal) we would have to create a new independent body to hear such appeals which did not seem justified in the circumstances".
	It is therefore slightly odd that the amendments, especially amendment No. 4, create an appeal to the first-tier tribunal.
	Conservative Members agree that, following the letter from the Select Committee, it is important to provide a right of appeal. However, it would be helpful if the Minister explained the discrepancy between the point in Lord Adonis's letter that a new body would have to be established, and the amendment, which states that the appeal is to be made to first-tier tribunal. Which first-tier tribunal? Lady Morgan, the Minister in another place, provides no explanation. Perhaps the Minister could let us know during the debate.
	I am baffled—as a result, I am sure, of my ignorance of the new arrangements for the tribunal service—about to which of the various chambers and tribunals an appeal could be made. Would it be to the social entitlement chamber, which covers the asylum support tribunal, the social security and child support appeals tribunal and the criminal injuries compensation appeals panel? Would it be to the war pensions and armed forces compensation chamber? The most likely candidate is the health, education and social care chamber.

Jim Knight: Let me relieve the hon. Gentleman of his pain. The appeals would be heard by a general regulatory chamber of the first tier. One of the aims and advantages of the new tribunal system is to avoid a multitude of small chambers. Given the small number of appeals likely, we do not think we need a chamber specifically for such appeals.

Nick Gibb: I am grateful for that response, which is on the record and will be helpful to those outside.
	Let me return to Lord Adonis's comments in his letter of 1 July. In that letter he said:
	"the enforcement system against employers is not a criminal one, and would culminate in a financial penalty recoverable through the County Court".
	The point to note is that we are talking about a civil penalty. For employers, the punishment for not complying with the Bill—that is, for not providing training or time off for training—is a civil one, whereas the punishment for the 16 or 17-year-old who does not participate is a criminal one. It is the fact that the Bill seeks to criminalise young people that has raised so many concerns. We all share the aspiration of increasing participation in education or training to the age of 18, but how will it help a young person if he or she sets out on their career saddled with a criminal record?
	The Children's Rights Alliance for England, the British Youth Council and the Association of School and College Leaders all oppose the provisions that introduce criminal sanctions, even though they might support the general aims of the Bill. The Prince's Trust, which has vast experience of helping the very group the Bill is principally aimed at, is concerned about criminalising young people. In her evidence to the Public Bill Committee, Martina Milburn, the trust's chief executive, said:
	"the bulk of the 40,000 people who we worked with last year had issues with drugs and alcohol. What do you do with a young person who is already going down the path of taking too many drugs and drinking too much and who just says, 'I'm not going to do it' and disappears?...Do you increasingly criminalise young people...or do you find some way of trying to reach them and sort out some of their issues?" ——[ Official Report, Education and Skills Public Bill Committee, 22 January 2008; c. 16, Q36.]
	My noble Friend Lady Morris fought valiantly in another place to try to find a way for the Bill's objectives to be achieved without recourse to criminal law. On Third Reading she said:
	"while we share the Government's ambition to see each and every 17 and 18-year old receive the best education or training to help them realise their full potential...Our desire in all this was to ensure that no young person received a criminal record simply because they were disaffected with the system, especially at such a critical age and stage of their life, when a criminal record could be disastrous."—[ Official Report, House of Lords, 11 November 2008; Vol. 705, c. 556.]
	The Government have argued that penalties cannot be imposed except by using the criminal process, but it seems that civil penalties can be imposed on employers, whether they be individuals or companies. The Government say that the civil procedures are not designed for those under the age of 18, but again, I am not sure whether that is true. The county courts are very used to dealing with rent and money issues affecting 16 and 17-year-olds. The Government also say that if a civil penalty is not paid, the ultimate sanction is jail, which the youth court process that the Bill uses cannot resort to. However, most civil penalties are enforced through attachment of earnings orders. It cannot be beyond the wit of parliamentary draftsmen to ensure that those are the only remedies in law for ensuring the payment of civil penalties of £200 or less in such circumstances.
	On the provisions concerning parliamentary staff, which the Minister mentioned and which the amendments would change, it is clearly right that all the duties and rights that young employees generally have should also apply to staff in the House of Commons and another place. As Lord Adonis said in Committee in another place:
	"It is right that this employment should count for the purposes of the duty to participate—and the duties to check that a young person is in educational training...However, it would not be appropriate for local authorities to have powers of enforcement against this House or another place."—[ Official Report, House of Lords, 17 July 2008; Vol. 703, c. 1424.]
	I take the point, but it might be helpful if the Minister could explain why that would not be appropriate. Does that also mean, for instance, that the House of Commons authorities cannot be prosecuted for breaches of health and safety regulations or for the standards of hygiene in the kitchen? It would be helpful to have an answer to the latter point before 8 o'clock this evening or before any of us pops out for a cup of tea and a muffin in the canteen.

Bob Spink: I rise briefly to speak about criminalising young people. It is in the nature of things for 16 and 17-year-olds to be disaffected and to baulk at participation. There is a great feeling that the Government have not done enough to find a way around the problem of criminalising them. We currently have too big a Government, with too much interference in people's lives and too much of a nanny state. I urge the Minister—he is a good man who understands these things clearly—to look at the problem again and find an innovative way round it.

Jim Knight: We will return to those points in the next set of amendments, so I will deal with them then, rather than now.
	I am grateful to the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb) for pointing out Lord Goodlad's letter and the importance of audi alteram partem, meaning "Hear the other side", which is what we have been doing throughout the process in the Lords. We will be debating the various ways in which we have been listening to the other side throughout today's debate.
	The hon. Gentleman underlined the reasons why we believe that the principle of having appeal is right, on reflection. I believe that I answered his question on the first tier of the new tribunals system that is in place thanks to the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007. To some extent, when the Bill was originally drafted and scrutinised in the Commons, the measures that are now in place in respect of that Act were not in place. It is therefore appropriate that we now take cognisance of them.
	The hon. Gentleman asked questions about civil versus criminal sanctions. I suspect that when we deal with the next set of amendments we will probe in a little more detail whether criminal sanctions are appropriate for young people on top of the range of things that are in place to encourage them to participate. However, it is appropriate that we have civil and not criminal sanctions for employers. The enforcement system for employers is not criminal. It culminates in a financial penalty that is recoverable through county courts, in which employers have the opportunity to present things from their perspective having used the right of appeal, if they so wish. That is appropriate, and we will discuss in a minute whether the measures for young people are appropriate. In essence, as the hon. Gentleman knows because we have discussed the matter at some length both in the Chamber, in Committee and in private, I believe that the youth court, because it is specifically designed to deal with training and sanctions for young people, is the appropriate body to deal with those matters for young people.
	On the basis of those explanations, which I hope are adequate, I hope that the House will support the amendment.
	 Lords amendment agreed to.
	 Lords amendments 2 to 23  agreed to [Special Entry]

Clause 44
	 — 
	Variation and revocation of attendance notice

Lords amendment : No. 24.

Jim Knight: I beg to move, That this House agrees with the Lords in the said amendment.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: With this it will be convenient to discuss Lords amendments Nos. 25 to 32, 40, 173, 178, 179 and 211.

Jim Knight: I welcome this second group of amendments that were made in the other place and I believe that we therefore have a stronger, fuller and better Bill. This group makes further refinements to the support and enforcement system for young people, which is probably the most controversial and debated aspect of the Bill.
	Amendment No. 40 enables a local authority to enter into learning and support agreements with young people. In a learning and support agreement, the local authority would agree to provide support and learning activity, and the young person would agree to comply with certain requirements. The young person must be involved in the process of identifying their needs and the best way to address them, and in negotiating the requirements that they in turn agree to stick to. That something-for-something approach is the model for our activity and agreement pilots aimed at 16 and 17-year-olds who are not in employment, education or training—or NEET—the evaluation of which will report fully later on in the year. Early signs are very promising that it is an effective approach to which young people respond positively. When we debated learning agreements in this House, I always said that they were best practice.
	Contracts or agreements are also widely used by voluntary sector organisations, such as Barnardo's and Rainer, in their programmes to support young people's transition back to formal learning. The idea is popular with young people. Learning and support contracts serve to emphasise that both the local authority and the young person have responsibilities, and I hope that the House will support the amendment.
	Amendment No. 24 is a minor amendment that makes it clear, for the avoidance of doubt, that where a variation is made to an attendance notice, as provided for under clause 44, all the requirements about the description of education or training in the notice apply as they did to the original notice. So the education or training must satisfy the central duty to participate, be suitable for the young person and so on.
	Lords amendments Nos. 25 and 26 give effect to another recommendation of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee. The amendments would ensure that the amount set in regulations for the financial penalty to be given to a young person could never exceed the maximum fine that a young person could receive in a youth court, which is currently £200. We have already said that, in practice, the financial penalty for young people would be significantly less than that figure, and I am grateful to the Committee for its careful scrutiny of the Bill.
	On amendments Nos. 27 to 31, 173, 178, 179 and 211, the Government believe that very few young people will reach the enforcement process, and I hope that very few—if not none—will reach the very end of it. If a young person fails to participate, a local authority must engage with them, find them an option that suits them and help them to take up learning again. Even after enforcement action has been formally started, there will be a process of administrative sanctions, support and dialogue with a young person before they can reach the youth court.
	I remind the House that the local authority needs to engage with the young person and offer them appropriate learning and support. If that is not taken up, a formal offer will be made, followed by an attendance notice, and if that does not work, the matter will go to the attendance panel. In turn, if the young person still fails to engage after that fourth stage, a fixed penalty notice will be issued by the local authority to avoid the need to enforce the matter through the courts. If the young person then fails to pay the fixed penalty notice, there is a right to appeal to the attendance panel. It is only then, if the attendance panel agrees with and confirms the need for the notice, that the matter goes to the youth court. That is at the end of a very long process with many stages, and if a young person re-engages in learning or has a reasonable excuse at any one of those stages, all enforcement action will cease.

Graham Stuart: The Minister says that if the young person goes back into education, all enforcement action will cease. Does that mean that they could continually engage with the enforcement process and go back enough to return to ground zero again? How will he ensure that they do not take the mick out of the system?

Jim Knight: Naturally, we are concerned about mick-takers, so the process would not go all the way back to the beginning. In the end, the matter would come down to the judgment of the attendance panel, at the points at which I have described it working. If someone came back before the panel pretty rapidly and its members felt that they were a mick-taker, the panel would want to move pretty rapidly through the rest of the stages. I hope that that satisfies the hon. Gentleman in respect of such individuals.
	Should enforcement action be taken against a young person, however, it is the Government's clear position that no young person should enter custody as a result of committing the offence of failing to comply with an attendance notice without reasonable excuse. We are satisfied that there are sufficient safeguards in place to ensure that that will not happen to those aged under 18, and custody will not be available to the youth courts in respect of defaulting on the payment of a fine. Furthermore, we do not believe it is realistic that, in practice, any court would impose a custodial sentence for non-payment of a level 1 fine on someone more than 18 years old. However, the amendments would achieve greater certainty on that point and remove even the theoretical possibility of the situation occurring by transferring from the magistrates court to the county court the enforcement of a fine imposed for that offence only once the individual concerned had turned 18.
	Building on all that, I turn finally to Lords amendment No. 32, which would introduce a commitment to undertake a review of the enforcement process for young people who did not comply with the duty to participate, so that we might be clear that the system was effective in reinforcing compulsion, and learn any lessons to improve the system. We have said that the review would be completed by 2016, allowing it to examine experiences of the first cohort to be required to stay until they were 18 years old. The review would also be chaired by someone who was independent to ensure that it was robust. The purpose of the review is to make sure that the support and enforcement system achieves what we want it to do—make sure that young people participate so that they can achieve, progress and reach their full potential.
	The group of amendments to which I have spoken serves only to strengthen the support provisions for young people and ensure that the enforcement system is robust and fair. I commend the amendments to the House.

John Hayes: We are pleased to return to our measured consideration of these important matters, which absorbed a good deal of the debate in Committee and the House of Lords. We are grateful to the other House for its close consideration, which gives us a chance to debate these matters again. Without at all wishing to crow, I should say that the Government have had a chance to think again about some of the arguments advanced in Committee regarding the issue of criminalising young people, which so concerned Opposition Members.
	Amendments Nos. 27 to 31, 173, 178, 179 and 211 ensure that ordinary adult fine enforcement procedures do not apply in the case of persons not complying with an attendance notice. Amendment No. 28 ensures that even pre-18-year-old offenders are dealt with in magistrates courts and that those over 18 are dealt with in county courts. Neither court has the capacity to impose custody, as the notes on the amendments make clear. Amendment No. 29 ensures that if the offender fined is over 18, they are dealt with in the county court. Amendments Nos. 28, 30 and 31 allow the Lord Chancellor to make further detailed provisions. Amendments Nos. 173, 178 and 179 are consequential amendments, inserting the words "or Lord Chancellor" after "State". Amendment No. 211 invokes the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 to allow magistrates courts to revoke youth default orders when the individuals concerned reach 18 and apply new fines, depending on how the young person has complied with the order. Again, the county court will deal with that.
	As an Opposition, we fully support the move to civil law, preventing custodial sentences and the utilisation of learner support agreements that delay the use of fines. The Minister has said a word about that issue today, and we debated it at length in Committee. We made the case consistently during the passage of the Bill and are pleased that the Government have finally agreed the position that we adopted at the outset. Time and again in the evidence sittings in Committee we heard that young people might be criminalised. That was of concern not only to the young people themselves, but, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb) has mentioned, to many of the organisations that work most closely with the disadvantaged.
	As compassionate Conservatives, we make no apology for allocating a disproportionate concern, energy and intellectual capital to the defence of the most vulnerable in our country, particularly young people. The experience of those who deal with young people—particularly disengaged and troubled young people—was made clear by their evidence. Those with such experience believe that if such young people were stigmatised or criminalised they could become entirely disengaged and impossible to re-engage in the education process. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton mentioned, the Prince's Trust waxed eloquent on that subject. I take this opportunity to wish His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales a happy 60th birthday; without him, there would not have been a trust to give the evidence that so informed our consideration and in the end persuaded the Government to change their mind. He is surely the greatest living Englishman.
	A representative of the Prince's Trust told us that
	"the bulk of the 40,000 people who we worked with last year had issues with drugs and alcohol. What do you do with a young person who is already going down the path of taking too many drugs and drinking too much...The question is how you deal with that. Do you increasingly criminalise young people and just say, 'Right, we're going to lock you all up,' or do you find some way of trying to reach them and sort out some of their issues?"—[ Official Report, Education and Skills Public Bill Committee, 22 January 2008; c. 16, Q36.]
	The evidence graphically illustrates that young people in the greatest need are least likely to benefit from a Bill that coerces them and ultimately—if they do not abide by their duties—criminalises them. We heard similar evidence from the Association of School and College Leaders, which said in its briefing on the Bill that its preferred approach to achieving full participation was persuasion rather than coercion.
	There is no lack of commitment among those on the Conservative Benches to the principle of increasing the participation of post-16-year-olds in education. Indeed, we regard ourselves as at the forefront of that campaign. However, we believe that we are most likely to achieve such participation by inspiring, encouraging and moving the hearts and minds of young people, rather than by coercion.
	In Committee, the Minister made it clear that he believes that the vast majority of young people, including many who are disengaged, can be re-engaged—not by compulsion, but by the quality of the offer that the Government would seductively place before them. Furthermore, when I pressed him closely on that, he acknowledged that there would always, notwithstanding that seductive offer, be a certain number who played truant. Truancy is at its highest level for 10 years, as the Minister must know. The percentage of half-days lost to truancy across all schools last year rose, and was higher than at any time since the Government came to office. Recently, they dropped their target to cut truancy, as he will know. We are therefore still concerned about the recourse to fines and youth courts, which should be a last resort.
	On Report in the other place, Baroness Morris of Bolton said that
	"while we share the Government's ambition to see each and every 17 and 18-year-old receive the best education or training to help them realise their full potential, our main concern throughout the Bill has been the issue of compulsion and the attendant sanctions this brings....The Government constantly reassure us that the checks and balances put in place by the Bill will make criminalisation extremely rare. We hope that it will not happen at all. However, we welcome the independent review offered by the Government."—[ Official Report, House of Lords, 11 November 2008; Vol. 705, c. 556.]
	Now we have the Government acknowledging the strength of the argument that we advanced in the Commons, but one or two questions remain. The Minister will want to make these matters perfectly clear, and we want his concession to be laid before us in the fullest detail.
	The first point concerns the scale of fines. The Minister has been helpful today, and the explanatory notes state in this respect that fines will be defined around the standard scale for summary offences at level 1. It would be helpful to have some feel for what that is. For the record, it would be useful to take this opportunity, in the House, to put some numbers to it.
	Secondly, the Minister will know that in Lords amendments Nos. 27 to 31, 173, 178 to 180, and 211, we deal with fine enforcement. It is clear that
	"failure to comply with an attendance notice without reasonable excuse"
	will lead to further action. Again, it would be helpful if he defined "reasonable excuse". It may be a standard legal definition or particular to this area of law, but it would be helpful to put the matter on the record.
	On the agreements that are to form part of the relationship between Connexions and young people dealt with in amendment No. 40, it would be helpful if we knew more in relation to young people with particular needs. I have in mind young people with special educational needs who may have a statement. Needs are defined in the Bill, as I understand it, but what about SEN and what about young people who may be particularly disadvantaged in making such agreements, and in so doing enabling themselves to comply with the law? Will the Minister say a word about that?
	I leave the Minister with those few words and questions. It is good news that the Government are gradually coming around—they certainly are not kicking and screaming; as we saw today, there was far more elegance in the Minister's performance than that—to our point of view.

David Laws: I know that the Minister will be disappointed if I do not speak to this group of amendments, especially when doing so gives me an opportunity to praise my colleagues in the other place. I believe that they were the moving force behind Lords amendments Nos. 40 and 32. I shall not detain the House too long, as the hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr. Hayes) has already done a comprehensive job in speaking to this group. I am sure that the Prince of Wales will be moved by the hon. Gentleman's tribute to him, just as we are all moved by the hon. Gentleman's modesty. Most of us here thought that the hon. Gentleman was the greatest living Briton, so it was remarkably generous for him to give the accolade to someone else.
	Let me deal first with Lords amendment No. 40, which introduces what the Government now call learning and support agreements. Those agreements sound remarkably similar to the learning and support contracts that my party sought to include in the Bill, and which I believe have Conservative support. I would be interested to hear from the Minister what was convincing about the learning and support agreements that was not similarly convincing in respect of the learning and support contracts.
	The Minister will recall from earlier discussions on this issue, to which we returned on a number of occasions, that one of our concerns was that there should be an alternative to being in education and training for young people who really needed support for a period, perhaps on account of mental or general health issues, family issues and so forth. The Minister included some of those issues in a letter to me, which helped me to anticipate the Government's thinking.
	Will the Minister clarify precisely when and how the learning and support agreements will be used? Our hope all along was that they could be used in place of education and training in circumstances where it was difficult, because of other problems, to get a young person to engage in education and training. I am still somewhat unclear from Lords amendment No. 40 about the precise circumstances in which the learning and support agreements could be used. Subsection (4) of the new clause set out in the amendment states:
	"The learning and support agreement must include provision (whether or not in the form of a learning and support condition) relating to the young person's participation in education or training."
	Does that mean, as I fear it may, that the learning and support agreements are to be used only to support a young person who must be in education and training at the same time as engaging in the agreement, or does the Minister envisage the possibility of a young person, with the agreement of the local authority, being in a learning and support agreement that provided the sort of support necessary for going into education and training, but before formally engaging in the education and training that were previously a condition and requirement of the Bill? Clarification on that point would be helpful.
	We also welcome the Government's attempts to avoid the custodial option for young people against whom enforcement action is being taken under the Bill. That obviously goes nowhere near as far as we would like, because of our fundamental concerns about the Bill. We continue to worry about the effect of taking this enforcement action against young people who may not be complying—in some cases, for perfectly good reasons—with the measures in the Bill. Removing the custodial option is very welcome indeed.
	Ministers made a further concession to my excellent colleagues in the other place regarding Lords amendment No. 32, which promises a review in 2016. That might seem a somewhat modest achievement, but we hold out the hope that the review may cause the Government at least to rethink if serious problems come to light in the policy of applying criminal standards to young people for failing to comply with education and training requirements. The explanatory notes suggest that, as the Minister indicated earlier, the report is to be made in 2016, but I may have missed some detail that clarifies that that is a certainty.
	I note, however, that the proposed subsection (2) set out in Lords amendment No. 32 states:
	"The person appointed must make a report to the Secretary of State on the review within a reasonable period after the school leaving date for 2016."
	Have the Government already determined that "a reasonable period" means that the review will take place in 2016? Given the description in the explanatory notes of the type of review that the Government envisage, will the Minister put it on record that there is nothing to prevent the review's conclusions from leading to a fundamental rethink by the Government about the policy of applying a criminal standard to young people who fail to comply with education and training requirements?
	The amendments fall a long way short of what we would really like to see in the Bill, but they are welcome concessions none the less, and we hope that after the Minister has spoken we shall be able to welcome them even more warmly.

Bob Spink: This is indeed a controversial set of amendments. Of course we all want to improve the life chances of 16 and 17-year-olds, but it is best to do that by means of inspiration and the creation of opportunities for them, rather than by means of compulsion. There are enough ways in which youngsters in that age group can get into trouble without our creating yet another. That smacks of unnecessary interference in people's lives, bigger government and the nanny state. I am surprised at the attitude of Opposition Front Benchers to the amendments, and also at the lack of interest in them; very few Members are present to debate them.
	I have not yet heard how many administrators and other additional staff will be needed to police the new system, what the cost will be, and how we will stop local authorities and others from doing what they do in this country—gold-plating the regulations, and taking them rather further than the House expects them to be taken. We have heard little about how we will prevent the youth courts from becoming bottled up if that happens. The Minister said that very few cases would end up in the youth courts, but we have heard such undertakings in this place before, and quite the contrary turns out to be the case when the laws are rolled out. We have not been told how, in the last resort, the payment of fines will be enforced. Unless a sanction is enforceable, it will be meaningless. As was stated by both Front-Bench spokesmen, there will be micky-takers in the system.
	We do not need this nanny-state measure. What we do need is the provision of real opportunity and inspiration for young people. We must provide ladders, so that when they reach an age at which they decide that they want to acquire skills and education they are able to do so, rather than enacting measures to criminalise them.
	My constituency contains six secondary schools that will need to increase their capacity considerably because of the additional participation of people aged between 16 and 18. Four of them are oversubscribed. There are waiting lists, and people are turned away. People write to me every week asking how they can get their kids into those four schools. However, Essex county council is closing one of them, and is allowing the borough council to sell the school playing field so that hundreds more houses can be built. What will the Minister do to ensure that resources are available to enable children in that age group to take advantage of further education?
	Some of those questions really do need to be addressed. I strongly believe that the Minister should think again before criminalising young people.

Graham Stuart: I agree with the hon. Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink) that the Bill's provisions are one more attack on liberty by this new Labour Government. We are now in the 12th year of this Labour Government, and one would hope and expect a Labour Government to put resources and effort into raising opportunities for those with least, but instead there are now more than 1 million young people in the 16-to-24 age group who are not in employment, education or training; that means that more than 1 million young people are missing out on either work or training. On Government figures, that is a 15 per cent. increase in the number of people in that predicament since 1997.  [Interruption.] I do not know what the Under-Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Mr. Simon), is muttering about; he is free to intervene on me, if he wants to correct me.
	The Government's policy has failed young people. It has failed them in terms of vocational educational opportunities, for instance. This year's big new measure is to do with diplomas, but just 0.5 per cent. of the cohort have taken advantage of it, and there is a real risk that it will fail. Apprentices are the other key area of opportunity for people who have not succeeded as they might have wished in academic pursuits. The Government claim that the number of apprenticeships has increased from 75,000 in 1997 to 250,000 in 2007. The Minister for Schools and Learners is nodding, and that statistic would suggest excellent Government progress, but the House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee reported in June 2007 that
	most of this increase has been as a result of converting government-supported programmes of work-based learning into apprenticeship.
	In other words, they are not real apprenticeships.
	In this 12th year of failure by this Labour Government to provide the inspirationa word used by the hon. Member for Castle Pointfor young people to engage with learning, the Government have now come up with the heavy-handed response of bringing in compulsion, and of setting up the bureaucratic nightmare, which was apparent from what the Minister for Schools and Learners said, of local authority committees and groups pursuing young people who have been let down by the education system. Instead of pressure being put on the education system and local authorities to deliver in a way that captures the imagination of these young people, the young people who have been let down are to be pursued so that they face a bureaucratic nightmare that can lead to fines, criminalisation and stigma. This is not the right way to respond to the difficulties the Government have had in reaching such young people.
	On the issue of compulsion, I seek reassurance from the Minister as to what steps he is planning to take to ensure that young people in further education colleges or schools who want to learn do not find that that is disrupted by those who have been dragged into classrooms by the bureaucratic process the Minister described. Can he also put me right on one other point I am concerned about? As a result of this measure, if there is an outstanding young student who at, for example, the age of 17 completes their school education and wins a scholarship to one of our top universities, but who wants to take a year off, will they be able to do so, or will they be compelled to be engaged in education for that year?  [Interruption] The Under-Secretary says that, according to my figures, they would be NEETs. The truth is those figures are provided by Government, and the Under-Secretary is quite free to get to his feet rather than

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. If we are to have interventions from either side of the House, that must be done in the normal way, and not from a sedentary position.

Graham Stuart: Thank you very much for that, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I am aware of your role as protector of Back-Bench Members, and we should be able to challenge Ministers, and they should not intervene from a sedentary position. If the Under-Secretary wants to correct the figures, he is free to do so from the Dispatch Box, but he does not do so.

Bob Spink: Is the hon. Gentleman as concerned as I am about the reasonable excuses that youngsters who decide not to participate can put forward? Does he think that that will be a bureaucratic nightmare? Can he think of any reasonable excuses? Does he know how far they will go, or how we will get consistency of interpretation of such reasonable excuses across the country, from Dorset to Yorkshire to Northumberland? Has he asked any of these questions?

Graham Stuart: The hon. Gentleman is right to raise that point. Indeed, my hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr. Hayes) posed just such a question to the Minister, and I hope that he will be able to clear it up. The fear is that there will be inconsistency, that different areas will apply this provision in different ways, that the guidance is poor and that this legislation has not been properly thought through.
	A central tenet of this Bill was to criminalise and ultimately to jail young people. That has been rightly dropped, but the fact that it was in the Bill until such a late stage suggests that it, like so many of the new Labour initiatives of the past 12 years, has not been properly thought through. Yet again, those with least in our society will be let down by a failing Labour Government.

Jim Knight: What an interesting debateit reminded me of the Second Reading debate of all those months ago. I am not going to get distracted by the new Tory party policy on who the greatest living Briton is, but I certainly join the hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr. Hayes) in wishing His Royal Highness a happy 60th birthday.
	The hon. Gentleman raised questions associated with absence and what he would call truancy rates. I remind him that, by the end of spring 2007, the absence rate stood at 6.44 per cent., on track for a rate for the year as a whole of 6.5 per cent.the lowest on record. In secondary schools, overall absence fell to 7.76 per cent. in the first two terms of 2006-07, compared with 8.16 per cent. for the comparable period in the year before and 9.07 per cent. in the whole of 1996-97. We certainly take no lessons from the Conservative party in respect of truancy.
	The hon. Gentleman mentioned people who are not in education, employment or trainingNEETsand I shall deal with that point in a short while. He also discussed the views of stakeholders on compulsion and enforcement. I do not argue with his version of events in respect of the witnesses who came before the Public Bill Committee, because there were certainly those who disagreed with compulsion, but I remind him that some agreed with it.
	The chief executive of Barnardo's, Martin Narey, told us that
	ultimately, after all the safeguards within the Bill
	this is an important point
	our position is that we support compulsion as a means of ensuring that the most disadvantaged young people have their horizons broadened and are prepared for a world of work, rather than a world of benefits and long-term poverty. [ Official Report, Education and Skills Public Bill Committee, 22 January 2008; c. 4. Q1.]
	He went on to say all sorts of wise and helpful things.
	Even the National Union of Teachers said:
	The impact of saying, 'This is now our expectation', will move everything forward. The penalty is a minor issue. [ Official Report, Education and Skills Public Bill Committee, 24 January 2008; c. 137. Q321.]
	In addition, the Prince's Trust, the very organisation to which the hon. Gentleman referred, stated:
	If you make it compulsory and you put in adequate resources...then it would make a big difference because, yes, you would get that shift on the ground. [ Official Report, Education and Skills Public Bill Committee, 22 January 2008; c. 21. Q52.]
	This policy seeks to create that shift on the ground.
	We agree with the Association of School and College Leaders that we are after persuasion rather than coercion, but we do not rule out coercion, at the end of the road, as a way of galvanising the whole system around children and, in particular, the journey that the current year 7s are going through as the first cohort to which this will apply. The fact that they know that they will not drop out and will stay on, and that everyone who works with them knows that that will be the case, will have a hugely galvanising effect on the whole systemit is certainly having a galvanising effect on my Department. Of course, enforcement is the last resortit must always be the last resort. I set out all the stages of enforcement showing that enforcement and, in turn, any form of criminalisation, is very much the last resort. As I have said, I hope that that is never needed.

John Hayes: The Minister knows that he has claimed, on the record, that the majority of young people who do not stay on post-16 will be encouraged to do so by the quality of the offer that the Government make to them and, furthermore, that, whatever we do, a small number will truant. Precisely what proportion of young people is he suggesting coercion will affect?

Jim Knight: We have a compulsory school leaving age, and it is compulsory for people under the age of 16 to go to school. That does not mean that some do not truant or that we do not enforce against parents to ensure that they comply with the requirement to ensure that their children receive a proper education, be it at home or at school. It is not necessarily helpful to speculate on how that translates into numbers.
	My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary told me that earlier today she met the Education Minister for the Netherlands, which brought in these measures two years ago. The experience there so far is that there is little need for enforcement. As we have said, the introduction of compulsion has changed the system. People are not asked whether they will stay on after 16, but what they will do in terms of their learning and education after that age. That is exactly the transformation that we seek to achieve.
	I hope that, like his colleagues in the other place, the hon. Gentleman will support the changes that we have made. I was very grateful to Baroness Morris of Bolton for thanking not only me, but
	the Bill team for its help throughout the Bill but particularly on this issue, and the officials at the Ministry of Justice for their time and patience in reaching this conclusion.[ Official Report, House of Lords, 11 November 2008; Vol. 705, c. 556.]
	She was very gracious in her remarks as she decided no longer to oppose our changes. However, if the Opposition feel as strongly about these provisions as the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr. Stuart) does, they should vote against them today.
	Questions were also asked about the level of fines and fees and the issue of reasonable excuse. The fine in the youth court on conviction would be a level 1 fine, and the maximum is currently 200, but it is determined according to means in each individual caseone of the advantages of the youth court route. The fixed penalty notice cannot be more than the maximum fine, but we have said that it would be significantly less. Indeed, when my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health was responsible for education, he saidon the publication of the Green Paperthat the figure would be around 50 in today's prices, and I do not disagree with that.
	On the definition of reasonable excuse, I wrote to the hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Laws) on 13 February, copying the letter to members of the Committee, to provide some further definition of reasonable excuse. I listed seven different examples of what that might mean in practice:
	If a young person is homeless, this could prevent them from participating in learning until they have a permanent residence and a more stable home life.
	Health problems, whether temporary illness, long term disability or ongoing mental health issues, could prevent a young person from participating either for a short time or for a longer period, depending on the nature of the health problem, its effects and the kind of treatment required.
	Where a young person has addiction problems they may be unable to participate until they have successfully completed treatment for these problems.
	Fourthly, when a young person has secured a place on a course but it does not start until the next month or the next term, they would have a reason for not participating in the meantime.
	After giving birth a young mother will need time to recover (for mothers of compulsory school age, guidance sets out that the normal period of time is a maximum of 18 weeks) and would not be expected to participate until appropriate learning provision and access to suitable childcare had been arranged.
	Where a young person has caring responsibilities, they may not be able to participate, or participate for as many hours as we would otherwise expect, until alternative care or learning provision that fits with those caring responsibilities is in place.
	The hon. Gentleman mentioned young people with special educational needs. The final example is
	if a particular learning difficulty has been identified and the right support to address it is not yet secured or in place, it would be reasonable to expect that the young person could not begin their learning programme until that support was in place.
	I hope that it is helpful to have that level of detail on the record.

John Hayes: It is extremely helpful to have those details supplied on the record. I asked the question so that the Minister could do just that. I wonder whether it would have been appropriateit might still be appropriateto put those matters on the face of the Bill, or at least to summarise them on the face of the Bill. I suspect that if they had done so the Government might have anticipated some of the concerns that have been expressed in the House and beyond this place.

Jim Knight: As an experienced Member of the House, the hon. Gentleman will know that notions of reasonableness are very common in legislation. It is important, I think, to leave flexibility for courts, attendance panels and so on to interpret reasonableness in the normal way. As soon as I start to specify details on the face of the Bill, and as soon as the House agrees to that, it creates an inflexibility that is not helpful for young people. I know that he is motivated by the wish to be helpful to and supportive of young people.

John Hayes: I apologise for interrupting the Minister again, but he has helpfully said that SEN might provide the material for a reasonable excuse. My specific point was about the role of special educational needs, and particularly statements, in the learning agreements. The attendance process is to be informed by agreements so, given that that will require a definition of need, will special educational needs form part of the contract?

Jim Knight: The agreement, as it is an agreement, would be personalised. It would be individual to that learner and be in accordance with their needs. If their needs were set out in a statement of special educational needs, the learning and support agreement would clearly have to reflect that. I hope that that is helpful.
	The hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Laws) asked a number of questions about learning and support contracts. I would say to himthe point reflects again on the subject of young people with special educational needsthat the process, in the end, is more important than the document. I think everyone agrees that it is important that there is negotiation and that the young person is involved so that both partiesthe commissioner of the education in the form of the local authority and the recipient of that learning and supportunderstand the deal.
	Our amendment puts emphasis on what has to happen, while my recollection of the hon. Gentleman's amendment was that there was more emphasis on signing the document. I know that that distinction appears to be like dancing on the head of a pin, but it is quite important. The hon. Gentleman asked whether we would use the document before enforcement, and whether enforcement would never be used when a person had unmet support needs.

David Laws: The nub of it was whether the learning and support agreement could be an alternative to education and training for a period of time or whether it had to take place at the same time as the education and training requirement is provided.

Jim Knight: I think that it is possible for a local authority, if someone has particular support needs, to sequence things so that those support needs are addressed. For example, if someone was suffering from addiction and it would clearly be impractical and inappropriate to compel them to try to take part in some kind of learning until the addiction problems had been dealt with and treated, the learning and support agreement could specify the sequence of support followed by learning. I hope that that helps the hon. Gentleman. I referred in my opening remarks to activity agreements, and to some extent they reflect that scenario.
	The hon. Gentleman asked about reporting. I think that I said that that would happen by 2016, so that is the time scale. I also said that we wanted to be able to reflect on the experience of the first year, so we are saying that there would be a report in 2016. He asked whether anything would stop a fundamental review following that review. Clearly, the review would be open-minded, and so if things were found that did not work, we would have to set out how we would put them right.
	The hon. Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink) asked many fundamental questions about the Bill that we debated at appropriate length on Second Reading, in Committee and on Report, and equally so in the other place. I am sure that he will excuse me for a relatively brief response because the arguments have been put time and again. The costs to which he referred are in the impact assessment, which was updated after the Bill's passage through the other place, so he can read up on them. Although the economic costs of raising the participation age over and above 90 per cent. are about 766 million annually per cohort, the total economic benefit is projected as more than 1.5 billion for each cohort of young people to whom the measure applies. In essence, the calculation of a net economic benefit of 2.4 billion for a 766 million cost is at the heart of why we are introducing the measure: so I reiterate the point, it substantially enhances the life chances of a young person to carry on learning until the age of 18, and to achieve at least level 2 qualifications, ideally level 3 and beyond, but it is also for the good of the nation. If we are to compete economically with the newly emergent economies, as Sandy Leitch pointed out in his report a couple of years ago, we need to raise the general level of skills in the UK. Keeping people learning is part of our effort to raise the level of skills.
	I have to tell the hon. Gentleman and his party, of which he is the only representative in this place, that we have to make the difficult decisionit is not easyof reinforcing with compulsion all the engagement, the new qualifications and everything else we are doing to encourage, cajole and persuade young people to carry on learning until the age of 18. If we do not make that decision, when will we reach the position of close to 100 per cent. participating? That is what young people need. Those who do not participate are the ones who most need to participate. It is a basic issue of social justice that the most disadvantaged are the most unlikely to participate. If we are not serious enough to support compulsion, when will that participation happen? With all due respect, I put it to the hon. Gentleman and to his friend, as he described the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr. Stuart), that unless they are serious about compulsion and unless they support these enforcement measures, it ain't gonna happen for the young people about whom the hon. Member for Broxbourne (Mr. Walker) spoke so passionately and eloquently on Third Reading and whom the Bill will serve.
	I noted the comments of the hon. Member for Beverley and Holdernessthat he regards the Bill as an attack on liberty. Obviously, it is unfortunate that he regards the Bill in that way and I hope it is not the view of the whole of his party, because I think the Bill is an incredibly progressive piece of legislation for all the reasons I have just set out. The hon. Gentleman tried to talk down diplomas, a bit like his hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove), but we have deliberately started on the basis of quality, not quantity. The hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness and I had a discussion in the Corridor a couple of weeks ago about whether he had time to see diplomas being taught and learned. At that point, he had not had time to do so. I do not know whether he has had time since then to see how excited young people are and how much teachers enjoy teaching diplomas, but I commend him to do so. We look forward to the numbers studying diplomas expanding on the basis of quality until the entitlement in 2013.

Graham Stuart: The Minister is right to say that we all aspire for the diploma to be successful. That does not stop us, as responsible Members of Parliament, noticing what is happening with them. There has been very low take-up; in fact, in the East Riding of Yorkshire one would struggle to find many students who are undertaking a diploma. That is the issue. We have to look at the world as it is. We need reassurance from the Minister that he can take steps to rectify the issue.

Jim Knight: Certainly, we are taking steps to ensure that diplomas are a good option for young people right from the word 'go', that they are taught, and will continue to be taught, on the basis of quality, and that they will continue to be appropriate for young people. When I have visited and talked to people studying for a diploma, and their teachers, I have heard nothing but praise for how well they are working in practice.

David Laws: Has the Minister not seen the recent comments of the president of the Association of Colleges, who paints a rather different picture?

Jim Knight: Clearly, one or two individuals will have a different view. The Under-Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families, my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth, North (Sarah McCarthy-Fry), has discussed those comments with representatives of the AOC, with which we continue to have a constructive and helpful relationship.
	Turning to the issues of those not in education, employment or training, the Bill clearly seeks to engage young people in their learning. The percentage of NEETS aged 18 to 25 is broadly stable, and has been for the past 10 years. We would like to do better than that. Among 16 to 18-year-olds, whom the Bill particularly addresses, the number of NEETS is falling, and I am sure that the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness welcomes that.
	We are continuing to expand apprenticeships. I do not think that they should be written off as lightly as he hon. Gentleman likes to do. We discussed them at some length when he questioned me as I gave evidence to the Children, Schools and Families Committee. He asked about gap years; the Bill is pretty clear on that. The Bill applies to people who are resident in England. If someone spends their gap year in this country, the Bill applies to them. If they go abroad on their gap year, it does not.

Graham Stuart: That is ridiculous.

Jim Knight: Well, my daughter went on an excellent gap year to Mauritania, and she got an awful lot out of it. She learned a huge amount. I would not want to do anything to prevent people from being able to enjoy such an experience.

Graham Stuart: The children of Ministers and other people on high incomes will find it much easier to have a gap year abroad. Those on low incomes may find it more difficult. Is the Minister not a little uncomfortable about the fact that a person who wanted to spend a gap year in this country could not do so without risking being criminalised by the Bill?

Jim Knight: If the person is under 18, which most people on gap years are not

Graham Stuart: Some are.

Jim Knight: Yes, some are, but if a person is under 18 and resident in this country, they will have to comply with the Bill and complete 280 guided learning hours, if they had not got to level 3. Clearly, in most cases, they would have got to level 3 before contemplating a gap year. Given all those scenarios, the hon. Gentleman's point does not feature as a great worry.

Celia Barlow: I regret that due to proceedings on other Government legislation, I was unable to hear my right hon. Friend's opening remarks. Some of my constituents combine a gap year with achieving level 3. Two weeks ago, I was lucky enough to visit Brighton Swimming Teachers Centre in Portslade. There, I met two young people who had achieved level 3 in swimming instruction, and who intended to go on to level 4 in their gap year, while earning money as swimming instructors.

Jim Knight: Excellent. I am pleased to hear that. I think that it was in Portslade, in my hon. Friend's constituency, where I visited one of the most excellent examples of a primary school encouraging young people to read. I would commend it to the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb), because I know of his passionate interest in the subject. I think that I have responded to the points that have been made. I hope that the House will support the amendments made in the other place, but clearly it is up to those who feel passionately that we are doing the wrong thing to vote against them.
	 Lords amendment agreed to.
	 Lords amendments Nos. 25 to 40 agreed to [some with Special Entry] .

Clause 80
	  
	The register

Lords amendment: No. 41.

Jim Knight: I beg to move, That this House agrees with the Lords in the said amendment.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: With this we may discuss Lords amendments Nos. 42 to 166, 192 to 206, 212 and 215.

Jim Knight: This group of Government amendments to chapters 1 and 2 of part 4 of the Bill put into effect the commitment made in another place that the Government would no longer seek to move responsibility for the registration, regulation and monitoring of independent educational institutions and non-maintained special schools from the Secretary of State to Ofsted. As Lord Goodlad would put it, it is a case of audi alteram partem, I think. This elegant three-point turn is a demonstration of the desire felt by my noble Friends and me to respond to reasoned argument during the passage of the Bill.
	The Government have decided to implement the change to the Bill through a large number of amendments to part 4, rather than by deleting part 4 it in its entirety and relying on the regulatory regime for independent schools set out in chapter 10 of the Education Act 2002, and on the regime for non-maintained special schools set out in section 342 of the Education Act 1996.

David Laws: Will the Minister tell us how the reasoned argument changed between the Commons Committee stage and consideration in the Lords?

Jim Knight: It changed in the eloquence with which it was put. The changes are being made because chapter 1 of part 4 of the Bill restates the entire regulatory regime for independent schools. The change also offers the opportunity to ensure that protections are in place for children in the growing independent part-time sector. As part of that, part 4 makes a number of drafting and policy improvements. To take one example, the Bill introduces new appeal rights for proprietors of independent educational institutions and non-maintained special schools against decisions by the regulator, such as any decision to refuse an application for initial registration from a new institution.
	The amendments in this group fall into three broad categories. The vast majority of them affect the three-point manoeuvre in respect of the transfer of functions from the Secretary of State to the chief inspector. Many of them simply replace the words Chief Inspector with the words Secretary of State. Others make consequential changes; amendments Nos. 59 and 60, for example, replace the power for the chief inspector to inspect an institution when an application for approval of a material change is made with a power for the Secretary of State, as the registration authority, to direct the chief inspector to carry out such an inspection.
	The second set of changes brought about by the amendments do not relate to commitments made in another place. Amendments Nos. 131, 138, 162, 164 and 196 are minor and technical amendments to change the tribunal that will hear appeals against decisions made by the Secretary of State, and in certain cases, justices of the peace. Clause 110(5) states:
	'the Tribunal' means the tribunal established under section 9 of the Protection of Children Act 1999.
	However, since the original drafting of the Bill, the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007, which we discussed earlier, has come into force. That Act consolidated the appeal and tribunal landscape, and regulations made under it will set out revised arrangements for tribunal hearings, so that appeals brought by proprietors of independent schoolsand, through this Bill, proprietors of independent educational institutions and non-maintained special schoolswill be heard by the health, education and social care chamber of the first-tier tribunal. I know that that answers one of the questions that the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton was bound to ask. The amendments will ensure that appeals are brought to the appropriate tribunal.
	The final set of amendments in this groupNos. 150 to 152put in place transitional arrangements to enable a smooth transition between the existing regulatory regime, set out in chapter 10 of the Education Act 2002, and the new regime in the Bill. Amendment No. 150 ensures that any actions commenced under the current regime can continue, unaffected, when the new legislation comes into force. That will avoid duplication of effort and ensure that standards are not put at risk by new proceedings having to be started against institutions that are not meeting the statutory requirements. Amendment No. 151 ensures that the 2,400 or so existing independent schools do not have to be re-registered when the Bill becomes law, and it allows the Secretary of State to waive inspection fees so that institutions are not required to pay fees twice.
	Lastly, amendment No. 152 ensures that directions prohibiting unsuitable people from participating in the management of independent educational institutions can be carried forward, as are any appeals, or reviews of directions, that are in progress.
	I hope that hon. Members will agree that these amendments meet all the concerns about part 4 that were raised first in this place and then in the other place, and will therefore join the Government in agreeing to them.

Nick Gibb: As the Minister said, the Lords amendments reverse the provisions in the Bill that transfer registration and regulation of independent schools from the Department for Children, Schools and Families to Ofsted. That is welcome. We argued against that transfer in Committee, and my noble Friend Lady Morris continued the battle in another place. Her powers of persuasion were obviously much stronger than my own and resulted in the amendments tabled on Report in the other place that we are now being asked to agree to.
	The policy behind the provisions in part 4 that sought to make the transfer have been fraught with error and poor policy making right from the start, even during the consultation process. The regulatory impact statement said, erroneously:
	Independent schools will benefit from only dealing with Ofsted.
	However, half of independent schools are inspected not by Ofsted but by the Independent Schools Inspectorate. The ISI inspects schools that teach about 80 per cent. of pupils educated in the independent sector, so those schools will not deal only with Ofsted. That is an extraordinary factual error of understanding that no doubt contributed to the original decision to move the registration and regulation of independent schools to Ofsted. The original consultation document was also materially wrong. It stated at paragraph 2.23 that the reason for the transfer
	has been prompted by the transfer of boarding school and children's home registration and regulation to Ofsted from CSCI 
	the Commission for Social Care Inspection
	from April 2007.
	That is wrong, too. Ofsted does not register or regulate boarding accommodationthat stays with the Secretary of State. What transferred at that point from CSCI to Ofsted was the inspection of boarding provision. Again, this is not a minor drafting errorit goes to the root of the Government's understanding of how these activities are carried out, and it undoubtedly led to the policy that the Minister is now seeking to reverse.
	The ISI and the Independent Schools Council were strongly opposed to the transfer. They have very good relations with the Department's officials in the independent education and boarding teamthey are able to pick up the phone to them when issues arise, and that has worked well for many years. They also feel strongly that the role of inspection should be separate from that of registration and regulation, particularly as there may be disputes over how an inspectorate interprets the regulations with which they are checking compliance. Given that there was no credible policy imperative driving the change, the only reason left was that of efficiency, or alleged efficiency.
	During the Committee's evidence sessions, I asked officials about the extent of such purported savings. One senior official said:
	We are still discussing costs with the Department.
	She went on to say:
	We are still working on the exact numbers. I am not quite sure exactly what numbers we will need to transfer to us, to do that work. [ Official Report, Education and Skills Public Bill Committee, 24 January 2008; c. 95, Q223-225.]
	Another official from Ofsted said confidently that he thought that Ofsted could do the work with between seven and 12 people. The Minister went even further when he said:
	I anticipate significant savings. I cannot predict whether we will move from 18.2 members of staff to approximately 10, but savings will be made. [ Official Report, Education and Skills Public Bill Committee, 28 February 2008; c. 784.]
	Contrast those statements with the words of Lord Adonis in another place six months later:
	having taken a long, hard look at the best estimates that we have of the cost savings from the proposed transfer of functions to Ofsted and balanced those against the potential disruption to the sector that would be caused by the transfer, I have concluded that the case for change is not compelling.[ Official Report, House of Lords, 21 July 2008; Vol. 703, c. 1598.]
	That was a very welcome change of heart by a much-missed Minister. I wish that Ministers in this House, and Ofsted officials, would take the same assiduous approach to calculating possible cost savings before announcing that the policy would save money. We need less bluster and more facts from the Government.
	Having said all that, better the sinner that repenteth. This is a welcome U-turn that we have been calling for in both Houses. As is the way of this Government, they put through their change of mind in the other place instead of here. That is partly down to the powers of persuasion of my noble Friend Lady Morris and partly due to the Government's mistaken belief that a U-turn in the other place is less noticeable than one here.
	These Lords amendments take out a large proportion of part 4 by replacing the words chief inspector with Secretary of State, and they constitute a large proportion of the amendments that we are discussing. They do not remove all of part 4, however, which will dismay some people, particularly those who teach their children at home. Part 4 gives a definition of an independent educational institution because the Government wanted to ensure that a small number of independent schools that provided only part-time education were properly regulated. Through parliamentary questions and confirmation by the Minister during the debate in Committee, such provision turned out to be just four schools.
	Education Otherwise, which represents tens of thousands of parents who educate their children at homean increasing phenomenon as parents worry about standards of behaviour in too many of our schoolssaid that these provisions might inadvertently catch informal arrangements to educate home-educated children using shared teachers, who have a particular specialism, in someone's home. In Committee, the Minister confirmed that the four institutions that he intended to be caught by the clause were Tyndale academy, Kids Company, Headstart Early Learning Centre and The Children's Garden. It is rather alarming, in terms of competence of policy making and administration, that the Government now say that that figure is not four but 1,100. In a letter to my noble Friend Lady Morris on 7 November, the Minister, Lady Morgan, wrote:
	When the Education and Skills Bill was introduced, we were aware of only four part-time providers...as more evidence emerged of local authorities increasingly using private sector and voluntary providers...an estimated 1,100 providers...might need to register as independent educational institutions.
	What is astonishing is the phrase, as more evidence emerged. It appears that the Government responsible for education in this country were unaware until this autumn that local authorities around the country were using at least 1,100 private education providers for alternative pupil referral-type education. It would be helpful to our discussions if the Minister could explain that confusion.

Rob Marris: I want to focus on amendments Nos. 150 and 152. Amendment No. 150 inserts a new clause entitled Continuity of the law. I would like some reassurance from the Minister about what appears to be a rather catch-all transitional provision that could allow those making legislation to cover their tracks and say, This transitional provision is sufficient for all of us retrospectively to agree that everything's all right.
	Amendment No. 152 inserts a new clause entitled Prohibition on participation in management. The Minister mentioned it in his earlier remarks about mischief regarding unsuitable persons and maintaining existing protections in that regard. As I read it, the regulations referred to in the new clause will be made under the terms of that clause. I hope that there will be no hiatus between the safeguards offered by the current protection against unsuitable persons and the introduction of the new clause, which would allow for such protections to be continued but would not in itself introduce them, instead relying on regulations to be made under that clause. I seek assurances from the Minister that the timing will give us continuity of protection.

David Laws: I would like briefly to welcome the 180-degree U-turn in Government policy reflected by the amendments, and to pay tribute to my colleagues in another place who were more convincing than the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb) and myself.
	According to the Government's explanation of the amendments, they decided that the case for changing from the status quo was not compelling. As the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton mentioned, I would have thought that the evidence we took in the consultation sessions at the beginning of the Committee's proceedings was fairly clear in making the argument against those changes given that a number of outside bodies gave evidence to say that the changes were unnecessary.
	As well as drawing attention to this satisfactory U-turn, can the Minister explain what changes he hopes to implement to improve the communication between his Department and the independent schools sector? We have heard from the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton that that communication has been extremely effective up until now, but it is clear that there are major weaknesses in such communication. Not only was part of the sector taken by surprise by the changes, but if they had been consulted on in a more serious manner, we might have avoided the protracted debates and time-consuming processes that we have gone through in recent months.

Jim Knight: This brief debate was an opportunity for the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb) to make the points that I thought he would make about our small change of heart in this policy area. I am grateful for his warm comments on my noble Friend Lord Adonis. Naturally, as the Minister with responsibility for the Bill, I discuss with Ministers who have responsibility for other policy areassuch as independent schoolsdebates in the Commons, so the words of the hon. Gentleman and those of the hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Laws) were not in vain during those debates because I reported their comments to my noble Friend. I justified the policy at the time, and he made the decision in the Lords, having listened to further debate, that the case for change was not as compelling as we previously thought.
	The hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton asked about home schooling and part-time providers, who are mostly engaged in alternative provision. We respect the right of parents to educate their children at home if they so wish, and as I said a number of times in Committee, the family home is not an educational institution and will not fall under the definition of institutions regulated under the Bill. Children educated alone by a parent at all times, regardless of location, will be regarded as those receiving home education and there would be no need to register.
	Given that all children are entitled to learn in a safe environment, the state has a responsibility to make sure that minimum standards are met if they are not supervised by their parents so that they learn in safe premises, where child welfare and protection standards are met and where their education meets minimum standards. Where home education takes place in a pooled setting, and the child's education is not supervised by the parent, it is right that such provision should be registered.
	The hon. Gentleman asked about part-time providers, and his recollection is right. When we initially took the Bill through the Commons, we were talking about four part-time providers. The work we then did through a telephone surveyit is not desperately authoritativeover the summer reinforces the need for registration. We spoke to just under 50 local authorities following the Back on Track White Paper about alternative provision and found that there may be up to 1,100 providers that need to register. I stress to the hon. Gentleman and the House that the figure is up to 1,100 providersI estimate the figure to be between 130 and 1,100. It was not the most authoritative survey, but that figure reinforces the need for some sort of regulation. It is clear that the likely size of this educational sector makes it more, not less, important that coherent statutory standards are applied to those providers. The 135,000 young people each year who are not educated in schools comprise some of the most vulnerable in society and it is right that the settings in which they are educated should be properly registered and regulated.

Nick Gibb: Am I wrong to be astonished that the Minister's Department did not know that 150 local authorities were using up to 1,100 private sector part-time providers to provide alternative education in their areas?

Jim Knight: Local authorities have a large amount of delegated freedoms, contrary to the narrative we sometimes hear in this place. Where young people have dropped out of, or been excluded from, mainstream education, local authorities have been using whatever providers they deem fit to provide alternative provision for those young people. I was surprised that the number was as high as the survey might have revealed, but that has reinforced the need to register and to regulate.

Kelvin Hopkins: I agree with my right hon. Friend about the need for registration, but is the lack of state provision in special establishments the result of closures in the past, when we rushed too quickly for an all-inclusive approach to education for children who need special education in special establishments?

Jim Knight: I am not sure that it is a result of a rush to closure or that we need to enter into the debate on inclusion for children with special educational needs. Such alternative provision is often required for those with behavioural problems; there would obviously be a high percentage of pupils with SEN, but the principal issue relates to those whose behavioural needs could not be dealt with in mainstream education, meaning that some other form of provision had to be commissioned.

Kelvin Hopkins: I am digressing somewhat from the debate, but I wanted to make a point that I have made before to my right hon. Friend. Would it not be sensible to look seriously at the idea of local authorities forming consortiums that could provide specialist establishments in the public sector for children with very special needs, given that almost all of us have come across such children?

Jim Knight: My hon. Friend follows such matters closely, and he will know that as a result of the White Paper we published this year, we have focused a lot more on these issues. We are interested in innovative approaches to improving provision, and we want to raise the overall quality of provision for those young people. It is precisely because of the measures we are taking to raise the participation age that we must not give up on any young person, even when they have made mistakes. We are ensuring that local authorities commission the right provision to get those people back on track.

Nick Gibb: Does not the debate reveal that a coach and horses has been driven through the Minister's policy? The White Paper, Back on Track, to which he referred, was published in May 2008. At that point, I understand that he had no idea that local authorities were using 1,100 private sector alternative education providers, but he had already formed what he thought would be the policy to improve alternative provision in local authority areas. In his letter of 4 September, he said that his telephone survey was carried out between early June and early July, but he had already formulated his policy in May, before he acquired that crucial piece of information about alternative education in this country.

Jim Knight: The White Paper was drawn up in the context of ensuring that we improved the quality of alternative provision. How that provision was registered came to light in the summer as we sought to implement the White Paper and as we prepared for the announcement of 12 pilots in October in order to develop new and innovative forms of alternative provision. I make no apology for wanting to drive forward whatever sort of vehicle the hon. Gentleman may propose to ensure that vulnerable young people are educated in registered provision that can be properly inspected, and to ensure that that education is of the appropriate quality.
	My hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Rob Marris) raised some issues about transitional provisions and the amendments that deal with them. The new clause that amendment No. 150 would insert are intended to provide for the seamless continuity of the law, a phrase that my hon. Friend used about actions begun but not completed under the existing regulatory regime. The purpose is to prevent unnecessary delays and complications in dealing with on-going cases from arising. Clause 151 contains a power to make specific transitional provisions, if necessary. A specific transitional provision would trump the general continuity provision in amendment No. 150.
	Amendment No. 151 is intended to provide for the seamless continuity of the register of independent schools in England. The existing register is kept under section 158 of the Education Act 2002. Clause 80 provides for the new register of independent educational institutions, which will include the existing register and any part-time providers. As we have just discussed, they will be registered under clause 77.
	My hon. Friend asked about an hiatus with respect to amendment No. 152. I can assure him that there will be no hiatus. As soon as the Bill comes into force, the amendment will allow us to ensure that that transfer of responsibility takes place. We will lay the regulations before the new legislative regime comes into force. Amendment No. 150(6) would grant the power to make the detailed relevant provision. I hope that I have answered my hon. Friend's questions.
	I hope that my other comments have dealt with the queries of the hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Laws). I wish to add that the relationship with the Independent Schools Council is important. It inspects many independent schools

Nick Gibb: That is the Independent Schools Inspectorate.

Jim Knight: Indeed. The Independent Schools Council represents many independent schools. We have a good relationship with many independent schools and I was pleased to visit, for example, Epsom college, last week to mark its sponsorship of Lambeth academy. It joins the United Learning Trust as a sponsor of Lambeth academy and will help the academy to develop its sixth form. That is a positive step for independent schools working with state-maintained schools.

David Laws: Is the Minister confident that communication between the Department and the independent schools groups is strong enough to avoid problems in future?

Jim Knight: We have held discussions with the Independent Schools Council and reached agreement on the three main concerns that it has raised with us. To avoid doubt, I will reiterate the commitments.
	First, we have agreed that regulations under the new standard for leadership and management in clause 79 will be modelled on the Independent Schools Inspectorate's criteria for judging leadership and management in its current inspections framework.
	Secondly, in abolishing the category of schools approved under section 347 of the Education Act 1996, we are clear that we do not want to introduce extra bureaucracy as a result of a deregulatory measure. We are therefore committed to publishing a central list of all independent schools that are registered as being specially organised to provide for children with special educational needs, as the Independent Schools Council has requested. In doing that, we look to the possibility of enhancing the information available to parents and local authorities that is contained on the list.
	Thirdly, to discourage local authorities from additional red tape for schools, we will publish strengthened and clear guidance, on which we will consult. We will certainly consult bodies that represent independent schools. Indeed, throughout the implementation of the changes, the Department will continue to work closely with the sector and the schools affected by the repeal of section 347.
	I hope that we have had sufficient discussion for the House to approve the amendments.
	 Lords amendment agreed to.
	 Lords amendments Nos. 42 to 166 agreed to [some with Special Entry] .

Clause 137
	  
	Meaning of sixth form education etc

Lords amendment: No. 167.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I beg to move, That this House agrees with the Lords in the said amendment.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: With this it will be convenient to discuss Lords amendments Nos. 180, 185, 186, 188, 190, 207 and 213.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: The amendment is about school admissions. Whenever a new code on school admissions is issued, it must be consulted on first. The amendment confirms, for the avoidance of doubt, that the requirement to consult will be satisfied by consulting about a draft code that refers to provisions in the measure that are not yet law. That will allow the codes to remain current and relevant, and reduce the overall burden of consultation on audiences such as schools and local authorities.
	The remainder of the amendments in the group are technical or consequential. Amendments Nos. 185, 186 and 188 relate to the commencement of the school admissions provisions by the Welsh Ministers. The amendments make a slight change to the power of the Welsh Ministers to commence paragraph 58 of schedule 1, so that it is in line with the remainder of their commencement powers.
	Amendment No. 180 makes the meaning of prescribed and regulations clearer throughout the measure. For the avoidance of doubt, it is better for those terms to be set out in the Bill. Amendment No. 190 will make it clearer in drafting that, apart from subsections (1) to (3) of clause 154, the Secretary of State will bring the remaining provisions into force by order.
	Amendments Nos. 207 and 213 provide consequential amendments to the Welfare Reform and Pensions Act 1999. They ensure that social security information may be shared between the Department for Work and Pensions and a county council, when that county council exercises social security functions for a young person for whom it is also required to provide support via the Connexions services. Regulations made under that social security legislation define a local authority by reference to the Social Security Administration Act 1992. That definition of local authority does not include a county council of England. Therefore, but for the amendments, the current data sharing could not continue when a county council exercised Connexions functions.
	The amendments are purely technical, resulting from the transfer of the Connexions services to the local authority. They enable current practices to continue, and I therefore commend them to hon. Members.

Nick Gibb: I welcome the Under-Secretary to her new position and to the Dispatch Box to discuss the final stages of the Bill. She missed many months of interesting debate

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I served on the Committee.

Nick Gibb: I do not remember that. It was many months ago and I have forgotten.
	The amendment typifies the Labour Government's obsession with admissions. As my hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove) said on Report:
	Unfortunately, there is still an old Labour, socialist approach to the question of admissions... It is the Secretary of State's belief that what really matters is manipulating access to a limited number of good school places, instead of expanding their number overall. If only he would commit as much intellectual energy to generating more good school places as he does to the micro-management of their allocation, this country would be in a better place.[ Official Report, 13 May 2008; Vol. 475, c. 1239.]
	Conservative Members believe in a fair and clear admissions system and we therefore support the concept of an admissions code.
	However, our priority is to increase the number of good schools by making it easier for new providers to establish new schools, thereby giving parents a genuine choice of school for their children, focusing on raising academic and behavioural standards, and ensuring that the teaching of reading in reception class is effective. By contrast, the Government have devoted huge amounts of effort to continual changes to the admissions code and pillorying faith schools.
	In the final stages of the Bill's passage, the Government tabled two dozen new clauses and amendments to the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 about admissions. It was all very last minute and rushed, without the usual Committee stage scrutiny and consultation. Now the Government seek approval of an amendment passed in another place to allow the public consultation, which closed in October, on the new draft admissions code to be valid, notwithstanding the fact that the draft code is based on the new clauses, which have not yet received Royal Assent. That is all indicative of an over-ideological obsession with admissions, which is so characteristic of the Government in general and the Minister's boss, the Secretary of State, in particular.
	The truth is that what determines a good school is not its intake, but its leadership and the quality of teaching. I can take hon. Members to schools in the most deprived parts of our inner cities and with every possible disadvantage that are safe, secure and highly successful and which have high levels of academic achievement. By contrast, there are many schools in leafy suburbs where the take-up of free school meals is well below the national average and where behaviour is out of control and academic standards are poor.

John Mann: Name them.

Nick Gibb: I could give the hon. Gentleman a list if he wishes. I recommend that he go to Mossbourne academy in Hackney, for example, where 50 per cent. of the children qualify for free school meals and 40 per cent. speak English as a second language, and where he will see exemplary behaviour.

John Mann: The hon. Gentleman mentioned the leafy suburbs, so could he please give me a list for Nottinghamshire?

Nick Gibb: I am not going to start criticising schools in leafy suburbs, but there are many schools across the country which have few indicators of deprivation, but which are not achieving as well as Mossbourne academy in Hackney. The vast majority of comprehensive schools have between 10 and 21 per cent. of pupils on free school meals. Simply moving children around so that every school has the national average of 14 per cent. of pupils qualifying for free school meals would not make the slightest difference to the quality of education in those schools. As I have said, one of the best comprehensives in the country has half its children qualifying for free school meals. The objective of a Conservative Government would be to concentrate on standards of behaviour, assessing and streaming, school uniform and high academic achievement.

David Laws: Is the hon. Gentleman saying that he would remove or amend any part of the existing code of admissions?

Nick Gibb: The existing code does need amending and simplifying. Although we certainly agree with the principle of having an admissions code, we believe that it should be much simpler and clearer and that it should not be revised every year. That just confuses schools and parents.
	Finally, I want to say a few words about Lords amendments Nos. 207 and 213. They have amended the information-sharing provisions in the Bill, so that county councils can be included in the list of public bodies that can share confidential information about a young person, in order to assist those public bodies in enforcing or implementing the duty to participate. I do not want to reprise the extensive debate that we had in Committee about the rights and wrongs of information concerning a young person's health, police record, academic achievement or social security being distributed among a range of public bodies, from local authorities to Connexions. However, I still believe that there are some confidentiality issues at stake, as well as some important human rights implications, which will undoubtedly surface when those provisions begin to bite.
	The hon. Member for Hendon (Mr. Dismore), who chairs the Joint Committee on Human Rights, has raised his Committee's concerns about those provisions. He says:
	The Bill contains a number of information sharing provisions in Parts 1-4. These raise potential human rights issues, notably the right to respect for private and family life,
	and asks what
	safeguards...would be in place to ensure their compatibility
	with article 8 of the European convention on human rights. The Children's Rights Alliance for England has also raised its concerns. It conducted a survey of young people, who expressed the view that if children think that adults are going to share information about them with other people, they will stop confiding in adults altogether.
	The Minister for Schools and Learners said in Committee that the Government would set out in guidance how the measure would be used. Could the Minister replying to this debate tell the House the current status of that guidance? Is it drafted yet? If so, can we see it? If not, when does she expect to be able to publish it in draft form?

Kelvin Hopkins: I want to speak briefly about admissions, which concern me and, I am sure, many other hon. Members. I agree with the Opposition spokesman about the importance of leadership and a school's ethos. He is absolutely correct. In my constituency, we have some first-rate schools and some first-rate head teachers doing a wonderful job, often with children who have some disadvantages, such as speaking English as a second language and other factors.
	I would argue, however, that the problem arose because of the Conservatives, who introduced the idea of parental choice. That led to hierarchies of schools, from schools with a concentration of the less able, as it were, from poorer backgrounds to schools with the most able, from middle-class, academic backgrounds. That has happened in my constituency, as it has surely happened elsewhere too, and it has not helped. It has been socially divisive and has also meant that schools with a high proportion of those from disadvantaged backgrounds can easily say, It's not the teaching or the leadership; it's just the children in our schools.
	I do not accept that argument for a moment, but if schools had balanced populations within them, we could draw genuine comparisons between them. If every school had the same range of pupils and if one school was doing well and another badly, we would know that that was to do with what was being done in those schools. The problem arose from the idea of parental choice and the hierarchy of secondary schools in particular, which has arisen in my constituency and many others throughout the country.
	There are other issues to do with admissions that I hope my hon. Friend the Minister will consider. I am sure she is aware not only that people want to be admitted to what are seen as the target schools, but that sometimes schools are over-subscribed. For instance, there is a shortage of sixth-form places in my constituency. Some youngsters, particularly those who arrive late, over the summer, find it almost impossible to find a sixth-form place, because there are not enough.
	I hope that my hon. Friend is looking into how we can ensure that that lack of provision does not arise, so that every child, at whatever level, but particularly at sixth form, can study the subjects they choose and with good-quality teaching in a nearby establishment. That concern has arisen in my constituency and I am sure that there are other hon. Members in a similar situation. I therefore hope that my hon. Friend will look into those problems, too.

Rob Marris: I agree with the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb) that we want every school to be a good school and that leadership is important. There is still some way to go, but the Government have already gone a long way on that. One of the ways that we have done so is by providing leadership training and by funding schools better, because pupils will generally study a bit better in better buildingsthe important thing is staff and ethos, but buildings help, too. However, I live in a deprived part of the country, and if the hon. Gentleman thinks that input into a school does not affect output, which seemed to be the import of his remarks, he is living in a very different world from me.
	The hon. Gentleman decried the need to change the admissions code so frequently and I entirely agree with him. It is most unfortunate that we have a complex admissions code and that it keeps being revised. However, the driver for those changes is that some schoolsa minority, but a significant minoritykeep trying to get round the admissions code. That point is not based on anecdotal evidence, such as that which he produced about how good one academy in London is; it is based on a survey that the Government conducted to find out whether schools were complying with the admissions code. Surprise, surprise, that survey sadly found that too many schools, albeit a minority, were not complying with the code. The Government are therefore unfortunately in the position of either letting schools ignore the admissions code or enforcing it and closing the loopholes that a minority of schools seek to find within it

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. I wonder whether the hon. Gentleman could relate his remarks to the group of amendments that we are currently discussing, which begins with Lords amendment No. 167.

Rob Marris: I am obliged to you, Madam Deputy Speaker. Perhaps I will leave my remarks at that for the moment.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: We have had an interesting and wide-ranging debate, which you acknowledged in your remark, Madam Deputy Speaker. I would like to place it on record that we certainly want all schools to be good schools. That is the aim of the Government. However, we also want a fair admissions code. Indeed, we are amending the admissions code in the Bill to protect looked-after children. I would hope that the objections to revising the admissions code, which the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb) raised, do not extend to not helping looked-after children. We all acknowledge that they have a tough time and that we should do all we can to ensure that they have decent school provision.
	We have been consulting on our draft admissions code, and it is our ambition to be able to put it into practice from September 2010 to ensure at the earliest possible opportunity that the revisions to ensure a fair code come into place. If we did not agree to the amendment, the admissions code would not come into being until September 2011.
	The hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton referred to the exchange of information and his concerns about safeguarding. We believe that there are sufficient safeguards in the Data Protection Act 1998 and the Human Rights Act 1998. I am sure he will remember that that was set out in a letter from my right hon. Friend the Minister for Schools and Learners to the Committee in January this year. If we did not agree to the amendment, the current data sharing would not be able to continue. I am sure that we all value the service that Connexions provides on behalf of young people.
	My hon. Friend the Member for Luton, North (Kelvin Hopkins) does not accept, as I do not, that we should be able to excuse ourselves by saying that the type of intake determines the outcome of a school. We certainly recognised that in our London Challenge programme, in which we put together families of schools with similar intakes, levels of ethnic variation, attainments and free school meals provision. We measure those against each other so that, to use a phrase that I have probably overused today, we can share examples of best practicea phrase to which the hon. Member for New Forest, West (Mr. Swayne) objected.
	I repeat that we want fair access, which is why our admissions code often relates to over-subscription, and I certainly agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Rob Marris) on that point. I said right at the beginning that this Government want all schools to be good schools. With that, I hope that the amendments will be agreed to.
	 Lords amendment agreed to.
	 Lords amendments Nos. 180, 185,186, 188, 190, 207 and 213 agreed to.

Clause 138
	  
	Power of governing body: educational provision for improving behaviour

Lords amendment: No. 168.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I beg to move, That this House agrees with the Lords in the said amendment.

Madam Deputy Speaker: With this it will be convenient to discuss Lords amendment No. 169.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: A school governing body already has the power under section 29(3) of the Education Act 2002 to direct a pupil off site to receive instruction or training. The clause provides that the governing body can also require registered pupils to attend off-site educational provision that is intended to improve their behaviour, such as anger management classes.
	During the Bill's passage, concerns have been raised as to how the power would be used in practice. My right hon. Friend the Minister for Schools and Learners had a particularly helpful meeting with my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool, South (Mr. Marsden) and the Special Educational Consortium to discuss their concerns. I would like to take this opportunity to thank them for their helpful comments. My right hon. Friend mentioned to me earlier that we can perhaps consider these measures as the Blackpool amendments.
	The amendments allow regulations to be made to determine the maximum length of time that a pupil can be required to attend off-site provision. It has always been our intention that governing bodies would be able to require pupils to attend off-site provision only for as long as is reasonable and necessary for the purpose of improving their behaviour. We intend to ensure that that is the case by making regulations that provide that governing bodies may not require a pupil to attend off-site provision for a period that goes beyond the end of the school year in which it is imposed.
	We will also set out in regulations that a review must take place within 30 days of the requirement being imposed, and every 30 days thereafter while the pupil is attending off-site provision. We intend to impose an obligation to have regard to guidance, and to issue guidance that will emphasise the need to pay particular attention to pupils with special educational needs. That guidance will set out expectations that an assessment will be undertaken to examine what can be done to improve their behaviour in schools, and how their needs are being met, before an off-site referral is considered. It will also recommend a pre-placement meeting involving the parents, the head teacher, a governor and a local authority representative.

Gordon Marsden: I am grateful that my hon. Friend supports the amendments, and I am delighted that the Government have been able to take up the points that were made by a number of organisations. I also express my thanks to my right hon. Friend the Minister for Schools and Learners, who was particularly helpful and constructive in the discussions that we had. As the Bill passes into law, will these issues continue to be considered, and will the efficacy of the regulations be kept under review? I am sure that the Government will want to continue to address as a priority the large number of exclusions of young people with special educational needs.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention and for the work that he did in Committee, as well as his ongoing work to protect children with special educational needs. We will of course keep the efficacy of the measures under review.
	As I was saying, regulations will require that when a child has a statement of special educational needs, the local authority must be invited to review meetings and be informed of the outcome. With those important safeguards, we are confident that the requirement for pupils to attend off-site provision may not be imposed for longer than is reasonably necessary to improve the pupils' behaviour. I commend the amendments to the House.

John Hayes: As the Minister said, the amendments deal with the power of a governing body to refer a pupil to educational provision to improve their behaviour. The House will know, as the Minister does, that of all the kinds of special needs, the problem of children with emotional and behavioural difficulties is the one that has grown most rapidly in the past decade. More of them are statemented than in previous years.
	Clause 138 gives the school governing body the power to direct a registered pupil to attend any place outside the school premises for the purpose of receiving educational provision that is intended to improve their behaviour. As the Minister told us, it has always been the Government's intention that any such direction would be a short-term measure only. Lords amendments Nos. 168 and 169 make that absolutely explicit in the Bill. It appears that the virtuous flexibility that the Minister for Schools and Learners advocated with such vehemence the last time that I asked for something to be put in the Bill persuades him less on this occasion. It seems that the Government are therefore likely to agree with the Lords amendments.
	My questions deal with what I believe could be unintended consequences of the amendments, although I acknowledge their advantages, which were well identified and articulated by the hon. Member for Blackpool, South (Mr. Marsden) when we debated the matter at an earlier stage. However, the amendments might prevent off-site education that extends beyond the end of a current academic year for those with behavioural problems. We believe that although the measure would not necessarily prevent permanent exclusions, it would prevent a head from sending a pupil to a referral unit or special school under clause 139. It might fetter the discretion of heads and, in so doing, weaken the resolve to tackle poor behaviour in schools. In the end, it could be beneficial to children with behavioural problems to spend more time outside their normal place of education, perhaps in a specialist school staffed by teachers who are experienced in providing the kind of help and support that children in such circumstances need. There is a risk that the amendment will have the unintended or unforeseen consequence of disadvantaging children of that type.

Gordon Marsden: I acknowledge the thoughtfulness with which the hon. Gentleman has presented his case, both in Committee and tonight. Is he concerned that in some cases, referrals of children in the circumstances he described are currently to pupil referral units? In some casesI am choosing my words very carefullythose units may not be adequate for the purpose of achieving the behavioural changes that the pupils need.

John Hayes: I acknowledge that this is a complex area, and the problem is that when we speak of such matters, by necessity we tend almost to speak in more general terms than the individual cases warrant. Behavioural and emotional difficulties are, by their nature, varied and complex, and the needs of the children concerned often require sensitive and highly skilled handling by the best possible professionals. The hon. Gentleman is right; I do not think that anyone, from any part of the House, could argue with their hand on their heart that such service is always delivereddespite the best intentions. He is therefore also right to say that we must be cautious about those referrals, their length and their character.
	I hope that the Under-Secretary will deal with my point, which is that the perverse effect of the measure may be to encourage permanent exclusions. If a head teacher feels that the only way in which they can cope with a child, in both their interests and those of the whole school community, is to exclude them permanently, rather than send them to a specialist school or a pupil referral unit for an extended period, that could be an unintended consequence of the amendments, which we broadly support, with the caveat that I know the Under-Secretary will deal with using her customary skill in the next few moments.
	With your indulgence, Madam Deputy Speaker, may I add this point? Earlier, I spoke supportively about the Prince of Wales, who has done such good work with the Prince's Trust in dealing with some young people in great difficulties, and I described him as the greatest living Briton. Of course, I did not include in that estimation Her Majesty the Queen, who is in her gracious nobility beyond such estimates.

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. There is a danger here of hon. Members bringing the royal family into these debates, and as hon. Members will know, that is not allowed.

Kelvin Hopkins: I have no intention of talking about the royal family, who behave very well, I am told.
	I shall say a few words about behavioural difficulties for some pupils, because there is a range of behavioural difficulty. Some pupils require special education in a special institution, but the great majority require temporary removal from a classroom, so I urge my hon. Friend the Minister to give as much support as possible, not so much to exclusion from the school, but to providing inclusion units within schools. I have seen them operate very successfully in my constituency. When they are run well by the right people, they work extremely well, but we should not force teachers to deal with unruly or difficult pupils, whatever their problem. They may have serious home difficulties or emotional problems, but the teachers should not have to deal with that; the pupils should be sent fairly quickly to a unit in the school. I have seen the inclusion units operate in my constituency to very good effect, but they need permanent, long-term funding; they do not need time-limited funding, which was the case with one such unit.
	The techniques are simple: pupils can be referred to such units for a few days or perhaps one or two weeks. In one school in particular, they are required to arrive at school half an hour after all the other pupils, and to leave half an hour after them so that the referred pupils do not get mixed up with other pupils. The pupils have that degree of separation, and their reward, when they return to class, is to be able to mix with their friends and to come and go with them at the usual times. All sorts of techniques can be used on a graded basis, and they can help with pupil behaviour, but overall, we need good leadership in schools, the right ethos and a calm and controlled atmosphere, which has been missing for too long from too many of our schools. I have seen schools operating absolutely brilliantly in my constituency, and I should be happy for any hon. Friend to visit them any time.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: First, I shall put at rest the mind of the hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr. Hayes) in respect of what he saw as the possible unintended consequences of the legislation. I think that I can reassure him on that point. Although the amendment would mean that we could not go beyond the end of one academic year, there would be nothing to prevent the school from starting the process again in the following academic year. We do not want the process to be renewable, and that is why we say that we have to start the process all over again. Reasons would have to be given, as would the same two days' notice, and we are not saying that the behaviour that occurred in the previous academic year could be a reason for placing a pupil in off-site provision during the following academic year. That is why there must be continual review, and also why I do not believe that the amendment would encourage head teachers to go for permanent exclusion. The matter would have to be kept under permanent review, and we want to give young people, having spent time in off-site provision, the opportunity to go back and prove that they are able to take part in education.
	In response to the comments that my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, North (Kelvin Hopkins) made, let me say that I am sure that there are excellent examples of alternative provision, and that is exactly what we are including in the pilots that we introduced on 23 October. The pilots are looking at innovative ways of securing alternative provision, and I hope that when we evaluate them, we can also consider inclusion units in schools as we work towards the best way to ensure that the rest of the class is not disrupted by bad behaviour by removing for a limited time the pupils who express such behaviour in order to help them reintegrate into mainstream education. With that, I hope that the House will agree to the amendments.
	 Lords amendment agreed to.
	 Lords amendment No. 169 agreed to.
	After Clause 139
	 Lords amendment: No. 170.

Jim Knight: I beg to move, That this House agrees with the Lords in the said amendment.

Madam Deputy Speaker: With this it will be convenient to discuss Lords amendments Nos. 181, 182, 209 and 210.
	The amendments were introduced by the Government in another place in response to the noble Baronesses Walmsley and Howe and supported by all parties. I think that they were based originally on amendments that the hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Laws) had tabled. The amendments would make a small legislative change following a major change [ Interruption. ] Sorry, I am referring to a different set of amendments. Madam Deputy Speaker, I do beg your pardon. Let me start again.
	The amendments would make a small legislative change following a major change in testing arrangements. They would amend section 88 of the Education Act 2002 to create an exemption for assessment arrangements from the general requirement that schools implement the national curriculum as it stands at the start of the school year. Instead, schools and local authorities would be required to implement the specified assessment arrangements for the time being. That will allow the Secretary of State to remove the obligation on schools and local authorities to administer key stage 3 national curriculum tests from 2009 onwards. The Secretary of State set out the rationale for the changes in his announcement to the House on 14 October.
	Section 88 of the 2002 Act requires schools to implement the national curriculum, including testing arrangements, as it exists at the start of the school year. The current arrangements are set out in secondary legislation under an order made in 2003. Amendment No. 170 would require schools and local authorities to implement national curriculum assessment arrangements as they currently exist, so that changes to assessment arrangements made after the start of the school year could take effect this summer. It is important to note that the amendments refer only to the assessment arrangements within the national curriculum. The amendments do not seek to change any other part of the national curriculum after the start of the school year, because that would create unnecessary burdens on schools and necessitate changes to the careful planning of teaching and learning that would already have taken place.

Rob Marris: Will my right hon. Friend clarify something? In amendment No. 170, proposed new subsection (2) would introduce to section 88 of the 2002 Act a new sub-paragraph, 1A(a), which uses the phrase, local education authority. Will my right hon. Friend remind me, because I thought that that term had been abolished by legislationin something like the Education and Inspections Act 2006?

Jim Knight: Local authorities are, in effect, the local education authority; in some circumstances, we still use that latter term in law. That is how I understand the matter, but I am sure that if I am wrong, I shall quickly get alternative advice.

Barry Sheerman: I understand that key stage 3 tests will still be able to be taken on a voluntary basis. Will that be on a school-by-school basis, rather than on a local authority basis?

Jim Knight: Yes, that will be on a school-by-school basis. If head teachers and heads of department find the key stage 3 test useful for tracking progress, as some independent schools do, they can use them for that purpose. Obviously, we will ensure that they are set.
	We want the changes to assessment arrangements to come into effect as soon as possible. That is why amendments Nos. 181 and 182 bring the legislative changes into effect on Royal Assent. We will then table an order to change the existing arrangements, because it would be unfair to compel pupils to take tests when there are no good reasons for administering them. The amendments will ensure that, this year, public money and school resources are not spent on arranging key stage 3 tests for which there is no longer a sound justification.
	To return to the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Rob Marris) made earlier, I should advise him that the relevant part of the Education and Inspections Act 2006 has not yet been commenced by order. That is why the language in this Bill is as it is.
	Amendment No. 209 is a consequential amendment to ensure that these amendments are carried forward when section 74 of the Education and Inspections Act 2006 comes into force. Amendment No. 210 is a technical amendment to ensure that the drafting of the schedule works in relation to these amendments. I hope that the House supports them.

John Hayes: As the Minister said, the Secretary of State announced that from summer 2009 children would not be required to take key stage 3 tests. The amendments were introduced on Report in the Lords to make technical changes resulting from that decision. Lords amendments Nos. 170, 181, 182 and 209 refer to the removal of the obligation on schools and local education authorities to implement the assessment arrangements in schools.
	We have consistently argued that there are problems with the content of some of the tests and that as a consequence they have, to some degree, become discredited. Those problems were compounded by the administration fiasco this summer.  [Interruption.] The Minister looks surprised, but he knows that on current measurements 84,000 pupils in one year made no progress, or fell backwards, in English between key stage 2 and key stage 3.

Jim Knight: I was surprised because in Westminster Hall on the Thursday prior to our making the changes on the Tuesday, the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb) said explicitly that the tests should be retained and that they were the most important of the SATs.

John Hayes: It is a pity that the Minister does not spend more time thinking about the children who have fallen back in English and maths than he does thinking about what my hon. Friend has said in Westminster Hall. My hon. Friend has been absolutely consistent in championing the cause of schoolchildren in this country, in his advocacy of higher standards and in his determination that the methodology in schools and the approach taken by teachers should maximise the chances of every child in this country. He deserves the praise of not only the Minister but the whole House for so doing.
	As I was saying, there has been a shocking decline in core standards among many young people, 28,000 and 140,000 of whom made no progress or fell backwards in maths and science respectively. These early years are among the most important in education; it is a tragedy that thousands of 14-year-olds have a reading age lower than 11 and that more than 40,000 young people leave school at 16 functionally illiterate and/or innumerate. Many of those young people fall into unemployment and delinquency, and they certainly fall into disengagement.
	We should get the figures right; the Minister got them wrong earlier. I do not want to suggest that his ideas on the issue are half-baked, but they are certainly not fully formed. You take these issues seriously, Madam Deputy Speaker, so you will know that the number of people not in education, employment or trainingor NEETshas risen by 132,000 in the past five years.

Jim Knight: rose

John Hayes: Those are the Government's own figures, and I am sure that the Minister will want to confirm that.

Jim Knight: My point was about proportions. There have been significant demographic increases in the numbers in that age group, which is why there has been an increase in numbers. The overall percentages, however, remain broadly stable.

John Hayes: The numbers that I have here are not proportions, but numbers of people.  [Interruption.] However, the hard figures and the proportions of such people aged 21, 22 and 23, for example, have risen over that period, and the Minister ought to know that.
	I do not want to detain the House for too long. In conclusion, we want fewer and more rigorous tests, less bureaucracy, more freedom for professionals and a commitment to excellence for all, underpinned with a special focus on the most disadvantaged. That is what our nation, our teachers and our schools deserve, and it is what our children deserve. In that spirit, I note and welcome the amendments.

David Laws: I seem to be rising only to welcome U-turns from the Government this evening, and I cannot let this particular one pass without comment. As the Minister said, there has been not one U-turn, but a double U-turn on this issue. One has come from the Conservative party, which, as the Minister rightly said, was praising the key stage 3 tests as the most important just days before it welcomed their abolition. That will teach the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb) not to be so honest and straightforward in how he answers questions in future. I am sure that he will have learned that if and when he speaks from the Government Front Bench.
	We welcome the U-turn on the key stage 3 tests. The provisions in the amendments allow for the Government to insist on the application of the national curriculum tests as they exist at the particular time of the year, rather than at the beginning of the year. That raises the subsidiary question of whether the Government anticipate any further U-turns on key stage testsperhaps a further amendment to the manner of key stage 2 tests. There is also the related issue of when the Government will clarify the nature of the key stage 2 tests in 2009. Will the Minister say something about both points when he responds?
	The Minister said that changes to the testing regime in-year were acceptable, whereas it would not be acceptable to carry out changes in-year to the curriculum, as that would be extremely destabilising. I register that point, but he may want to acknowledge that carrying out changes mid-year in the testing regime has serious implications for school planning and for those who provide materials for the key stage 3 tests. Like me, the Minister may have seen correspondence from publishers a large proportion of whose business was producing key stage 3 test documents for schools. They were less than amused by the very short notice given of this year's change in relation to the key stage 3 test.
	Will the Minister acknowledge that, although the abolition of the compulsory key stage 3 testing regime this year was desirable, and although it may have been prompted by the unusual chaos in the testing regime over the spring and summer, we would not want a change at such short notice to be an example of how the testing regime should be changed in future? That change has caused a great deal of disruption to schools and those associated with the testing regime, including those who supply materials for it. I hope that he will recognise that as he sums up and that he will assure us that future changes to the testing regime will be more measured and thought out.

Rob Marris: I welcome the effective abolition of the mandatory key stage 3 test. That was long overdue, and the Government have done well.
	I want to focus on amendment No. 209, which amends part of section 74 of the Education and Inspections Act 2006. The 2006 Act itself would amend part of section 88 of the Education Act 2002. There are amendments to amendments, but as the Minister said, section 74 of the 2006 Act is not in force two years after its passage. Yet tonight we are amending it. I wonder whether my right hon. Friend can explain in a little more detailnot exhaustive detail, as I am sure he could if he wished tohow it has come to pass that an Act passed by the House two years ago to amend an Act that was passed four years before it is not yet in force, although tonight we are amending it.

Jim Knight: When I see my right hon. Friend the Treasurer of Her Majesty's Household, I know that I need to be relatively brief. I will attempt to be so. I accept that we have had some debate by way of intervention with the hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr. Hayes), and I accept his general support for the amendments with gratitude.
	The hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Laws) asked a few questions and commented on the rapid U-turn by the Conservative party. I can tell him categorically that there will not be any U-turn on key stage 2 tests. We have proceeded with the procurement for 2009, which is coming to a conclusion. As the Secretary of State said in his statement, we think it important that there is an independently assessed national measure of performance that allows parents and us to judge the performance of primary schools. That function is performed in another respect by GCSEs, but in respect of key stage 2, if there are any changes, those will be informed by the expert group set up under the leadership of Sir Alasdair Macdonald, the head teacher from Tower Hamlets.

David Laws: Can the Minister tell us when the announcement on the key stage 2 contractor will be made?

Jim Knight: I cannot tell the hon. Gentleman exactly when. As I said, that procurement process is coming to a conclusion. I had a note about it in my box this weekend, but as far as I recall the note did not include a date. In-year changes to national curriculum assessment would be exceptional; I am not proposing that we should make this a matter of routine. When we made the announcement back in October, some English and maths teachers got in touch to say, What am I going to teach now? I suggested that perhaps maths and English would be a good idea.
	My hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Rob Marris) raised some questions around the implementation of the 2006 Act. If I led him to believe that the whole Act had not been implemented, that was an error. Certain parts of the Act have been, and others, as has been pointed out, are still to be. I am advised with rigour that these are the appropriate amendments to the appropriate amendments of the appropriate Act. I hope that he takes my reassurance.

Rob Marris: Can my right hon. Friend tell me the appropriate date when those appropriate amendments to the appropriate amendments to the appropriate Act will be brought into force?

Jim Knight: As I said in my speech, the amendments will come into effect by regulation shortly, so they will have effect very soon. Clearly, they are in regard to the key stage 3 tests, which otherwise would have to be conducted by schools this summer. We will bring forward the regulations very soon. On that basis, I hope that the House will support the amendment.
	 Lords amendment agreed to.
	 Lords amendment : No. 171.

Jim Knight: I beg to move, That this House agrees with the Lords in the said amendment.

Madam Deputy Speaker: With this it will be convenient to discuss Lords amendments Nos. 172, 183, 184, 187, 189, 208 and 214.

Jim Knight: These are the amendments introduced in the other place by the Government in response to amendments tabled by Baronesses Walmsley and Howe, supported by all parties and, I think, inspired by an amendment originally tabled by the hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Laws).
	The Government are committed to involving young people as widely as possible in matters that affect them. We demonstrate that commitment by consulting children and young people in the development of our policiesfor example, in developing and evaluating the effectiveness of the children's plan. As we set out in the children's plan, the Government's aim is for all young people to want and be able to participate and take responsible action. Giving children and young people a say in decisions that affect them can improve engagement in learning, help to develop a more inclusive school environment, and improve behaviour and attendance.
	I am sure that no one, least of all schools, would disagree that the voice of pupils is extremely important. As hon. Members will know, we have already acted decisively. In the 2002 Act, we required schools to have regard to statutory guidance about consulting pupils on decisions that affect them. We want to build on that now to ensure that all schools are consulting their pupils, as a minimum, on certain core aspects of school life. We know that more than 95 per cent. of schools in England already have school councils, which means that they are fulfilling this new duty. It simply is not the case that this duty, as some have alleged, will mean extra burdens on schools. It will provide clarity about the essentials, so that all schools and pupils are clear about the matters that they should be consulted on, as a minimum.
	Next year, school staff, their representatives, governors and pupils will be consulted on what those essentials should be. We envisage that, as a minimum, those essentials might be policies relating to behaviour, uniform, school food, health and safety, equalities and sustainability.
	Involving pupils in participation and decision making is already a key part of the personal, social and health education and citizenship education curriculums. It gives young people the opportunity to develop critical thinking, advocacy and influencing skills, and empowers them to make an active contribution to their school and wider communityexactly the skills that employers are saying we need to develop more of in our young people.
	The new duty in these amendments gives a clear message about the importance that we place on the involvement of pupils in matters that affect their education and school lifeI make no apology for that. However, we do not want to tell schools how to go about their business. The regulations will set out just the matters on which they must invite views, but they will continue to be free to do that in ways that work best for them. We will not prescribe the manner of consultation or which pupils should be consulted. That will be for schools to decide.
	In drafting the new duty, we have sought a balance in defining a responsibility that is both unambiguous and manageable for school governing bodies. To that end, statutory guidance made under proposed new subsection (5) in amendment No. 171 will help schools to understand the scope of the new duty and set out examples of how best to involve pupils and invite their views. I commend the amendment to the House.

Nick Gibb: As the Minister has told us twice, the amendments were all tabled in another place by the Liberal Democrat peer Lady Walmsley. Few people, if any, would deny the advantages of a school giving pupils a voice in developing policies that affect the children at that school. That is increasingly accepted as best practice, and the best performing schools in the state sector will invariably have a long-established route through which pupils can express their views on key aspects of how the school is run.
	I am a particularly strong supporter of school councils, not least because the views expressed by those councils are often as strong on issues of discipline and behaviour as my own and those of my party. On rare occasions, some school councils that I have met go beyond even our zero-tolerance approach to discipline and behaviour.
	An ordered and safe school environment is a pre-occupation of pupil opinion in many of the schools that I have visited, even those where behaviour is good. As my noble Friend Lord Elton said in Committee in another place:
	One of the most convenient forums for this
	pupil voice
	is a school council where matters of discipline naturally come up quite quickly for discussion between the pupils and staff.[ Official Report, House of Lords, 1 July 2008; Vol. 703, c. 229.]

Jim Knight: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way, because this might speed things up. Does he not agree that Lord Elton is one of his noble Friends and that he moved the amendment in slightly longer form in Committee in another place, so therefore it would be untrue to say that these amendments were introduced and instigated solely by the Liberal Democrats?

Nick Gibb: This particular amendment was introduced by the Liberal Democrats, but I will return to Lord Elton in a moment. There is a common concern about extending the existing statutory duty on schools to take into account pupils' opinions. The concern is the extent to which the duty will be taken further and the fact that these additional duties will be statutory.
	As my noble Friend Lord Elton said in another place on Third Reading:
	I am sorry that it has to be in legislation. We are a litigious nation and it would be very unfortunate if we were to have a rash of cases of parents saying, 'You were not listening to my little Johnny'.[ Official Report, House of Lords, 11 November 2008; Vol. 705, c. 572.]

Jim Knight: Did Lord Elton support the amendment?

Nick Gibb: I have given the Minister the opinion of Lord Elton. This goes to the crux of our concern about these amendments.

David Laws: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Nick Gibb: I will not. The hon. Gentleman will soon have his moment.
	As my noble Friend Lady Morris, who speaks for the Opposition in the other place, said in Committee:
	I sound a note of caution.... It may not be the best course of action to be too prescriptive. We think that it is best left up to schools, not central government, to decide on the best way to engage their students.[ Official Report, House of Lords, 1 July 2008; Vol. 703, c. 230.]
	We fully endorse that view. It is odd, therefore, that a Liberal Democrat peer should have tabled a series of very prescriptive and centralising amendments that will, once statutory guidance is introduced, effectively dictate to schools the issues on which they will be obliged to consult pupils. I had thought that it was a Liberal Democrat mantra that such decisions should be made at the local level.

Jim Knight: Will the hon. Gentleman give way one more time?

Nick Gibb: I will not give way again; the right hon. Gentleman will have another opportunity to speak when he concludes the debate.
	Anyone going through the  Hansard record of any Bill passing through this House would see it littered with Liberal Democrat amendments, prescribing their particular hobby horses and policy imperatives. They are in favour of local decision making, provided the decision is in line with Liberal Democrat policy and ideology. The Minister, Lady Morgan, clarified on Third Reading what amendments she was supporting. She said:
	As a minimum, schools should seek and take account of pupils' views on policies on the delivery of the curriculum, behaviour, the uniform, school food, health and safety, equalities and sustainability, not simply on what colour to paint the walls.
	She continued:
	We are not minded to require governing bodies to take account of pupils' views on matters such as staff appointments or the school budget.
	She then went on to say a most extraordinary thing, which I can only assume was not said with a straight face, namely that
	we are also keen to ensure that a duty on schools does not end up with centralised prescription... The regulations will simply set out the issues on which they must invite views. If they want to go further, they can.[ Official Report, House of Lords, 11 November 2008; Vol. 705, c. 573.]
	That is an extraordinary statement. If the words regulation and must do not amount to centralised prescription, I do not know what does.
	It is not surprising that these amendments have received such a hostile reception from teachers and the teacher unions. As Chris Keates of the National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers said to  The Times Educational Supplement:
	This is completely unnecessary and will be open to abuse. It is a distortion of the important concept of pupil voice that will lead to headteachers and teachers becoming very disillusioned.
	John Dunford of the Association of School and College Leaders said:
	This is crazy. I am a strong supporter of pupil voice, but schools are increasingly consulting pupils because they think it is the right thing, not because Government tells them to.
	He went on to say:
	I am annoyed and furious that yet another in this continual stream of legal and educational duties is being placed on schools. They all bring unintended consequences.
	Our concern about the amendment is not based on the objective of encouraging schools to consult pupils on important matters affecting the school; rather, it is the fact that it is a statutory requirement. This is yet another statutory burden imposed on schools that are already creaking under the weight of fortnightly initiatives emanating from this Government. For that reason, I hope that all hon. Members will join us in the No Lobby to vote against Lords amendment No. 171.

Rob Marris: I declare a sort of interest in that, as you know, Madam Deputy Speaker, my wife was the head of a primary school for a number of years.
	I pay tribute to Dr. Bernard Trafford, who will be well known to the hon. Member for South Staffordshire (Sir Patrick Cormack), who I see in his place. Dr. Trafford is the former head of Wolverhampton grammar school, who has taken a national lead on the issue of democracy in schools and the question of schools councils. In fact, he wrote a very informative booklet on the matter, which I have read and would recommend to right hon. and hon. Members.
	I would like a little further clarification from the Minister: although I am not nearly as sceptical as the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb), I am still somewhat sceptical. I appreciate that what would become, under amendment No. 171, section 29A(1) of the Education Act 2002 includes the word must, as the hon. Gentleman has just explained. The full provision would read:
	The governing body of a maintained school must invite the views of pupils about prescribed matters.
	That brings us on to what those prescribed matters are. That is explained in subsection (4), where we find that they may be prescribed by the Secretary of State in England, and Welsh Ministers in Wales. That may be is therefore permissive. However, paragraphs (a) and (b) seem to be so widely drawn in respect of the matters that the Secretary of State may prescribe that I would like the Minister's reassurance. Paragraph (a) refers to
	the exercise, or proposed exercise, of a function of the governing body of a maintained school relating to the conduct of the school,
	and paragraph (b) to
	the exercise, or proposed exercise, of such a function in a particular way.
	The function of a governing body of a schoolI speak as someone who was a governor of a secondary school in my constituency for four yearsis basically to run the school. If the Secretary of State may prescribe what the governors do, my understanding is that anything may be prescribed down to the last jot and tittle or the last comma in the running of a school. I hope that that is not the Government's intentionI would appreciate my right hon. Friend's reassurance on that, particularly with respect to hiring and firing.
	I may be misreading the provision, but it seems to me that under what would become section 29A (2),
	the governing body of a maintained school must consider any relevant views of registered pupils,
	which suggests something contrary to what I understood my right hon. Friend to state in his opening remarks. It seems to suggest that the school must, on any number of issues that may be prescribed under subsection (4), consult every pupil in order to find out whether they have a relevant view or not. If the pupil does have a relevant view, the governing body, in exercising its functions pursuant to the regulations, must decide how much weight to give to it. How does it discover whether pupils have a relevant view or not? One assumes that the governing body has to ask them.
	As I said, I may be misreading the amendment, but contrary to what I understood the Minister to say, there is a how about these matters because they cover everything. If my interpretation is correct, everything in a maintained school is coveredincluding hiring and firing. I understand the desire to make pupils feel included, particularly if we are going to move to compulsory education or training up to the age of 18that means we are dealing with near-adults whose views should be taken into account; indeed, it is important to take account even of primary school pupils' views through school councilsbut how much weight we accord those views, particularly when it comes to hiring and firing, can be an immensely delicate matter. I thus seek my right hon. Friend's reassurance that the Secretary of State, in making regulations under proposed new section 29A(4), will not include issues of hiring and firing in them.

Patrick Cormack: I promise that I shall not attempt to speak any longer than I did last Wednesday, but I would like to make a couple of brief points. I speak not only as the MP for South Staffordshirethe hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Rob Marris) was kind enough to refer to thatbut as someone who was a schoolmaster for 10 years before I entered the House. Any good school has to have proud pupils; otherwise, it is not a good school. Proud pupils are those who like to take part, insofar as they can, in discussing with their teachers and others the running of the school. That is fine. However, to make that opportunity prescriptive and statutory is going a step too far.
	The road to hell is paved with good intentions and I do not doubt the good intentions of those who moved the amendment in the other place. I am sorry to find myself at odds with, for example, the noble Baroness Howe, for whom I have the highest possible regard, but on this issue, she and those who support her are just plain wrong, because they have gone too far.
	My parliamentary neighbour, the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West, made an admirable brief speech in which he pointed out some of the problems that will follow if we make this provision statutoryparticularly if we allow future Secretaries of State to determine through future regulation what pupils must be consulted on. Nine times out of 10, anyone who goes into any school nowadays and asks what the head wants of Government will be told To be left to get on with the job and run the school as I would wish to run it with my colleagues and my governors, without interference.
	Over the last 10 years, the schools of this country have become burdened with excessive legislation. That is not entirely the fault of the present Government; the previous Conservative Government were also guilty of passing too many laws, in relation to health as well as education. We saw the absurdity of that tonight when we were discussing earlier amendments. It became clear that part of an Act that was passed in 2006 was effectively being repealed by this Bill although it had never been brought into force. Other examples, for instance in criminal justice legislation, demonstrate a similar legislative diarrhoea which has led to a rather unpleasant illness.
	No one doubts the good intentions behind the amendment, but I ask the Minister to listen to the teachersunion leaders and otherswho, over the weekend, described it as a step too far, and asked for it not to be made statutory. I hope that the thoughtful and sensible words of the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West will ensure that we enter the same Lobbyif, that is, the Government persist with the amendments. It would be far better for us to disagree with the Lords and, while encouraging schools to have their councils and other forms of consultation, refrain from putting pupils into the driving seat and introducing the utter absurdity of involving them in what the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West described as issues of hiring and firing. That would be entirely wrong.
	I agree with what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb). I will vote accordingly if a vote is necessary, but I hope that it will not be.

David Laws: Although I enjoyed the speech by the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb), I noticed that he was somewhat more reticent than usual when it came to allowing interventions. That may have been because the force of his argument against the amendments was somewhat undermined by the fact that they had enjoyed the support of his party in another place and, moreover, by the fact that he did not quote in full Lord Elton's words from the Third Reading debate on 11 November. He spoke of the noble Lord's reservations, but omitted the most important part of the quotation. Lord Elton said:
	I am glad to see the flexibility written into the amendmentthe variety of ways in which consultation can take place.[ Official Report, House of Lords, 11 November 2008; Vol. 705, c. 572.]
	It is clear from those comments that although Lord Elton may have been concerned about the implications of too great a degree of prescriptiveness, he felt that the degree of flexibility in the amendment was quite acceptable.
	Because he is assiduous in these matters, the hon. Gentleman will also know that, to some extent, the Liberal Democrat amendment was prompted by Lord Elton's amendment. He did not take quite enough credit for the role played by the Conservative party in another place in originating these proposals. Lord Elton tabled amendment No. 61, which sought to place a duty on the governing body of a maintained school
	to have due regard to the ascertainable views of the pupil on matters that affect him or her, taking account of his or her age and maturity.
	Subsection (2) of the amendment stated:
	A governing body of a maintained school must establish a democratically formed school council or other collective mechanism, the purpose of which is to enable pupils to discuss matters relating to their school and their education and to make representations on these to the government body and the head teacher.
	The hon. Gentleman expressed concern about the prescriptive nature of the amendment tabled by my noble Friend Lady Walmsley. What did she actually say when she had to comment on Lord Elton's amendment? She hesitated to support it, and also, she said,
	hesitated to be too prescriptive about the way in which the voice of the students should be collected.
	She continued:
	We devised our own amendment that did not specify a school council because we did not want to be too prescriptive; we wanted to give schools the opportunity to be creative and respond appropriately to their own circumstances, devising their own ways of gathering students' views.[ Official Report, House of Lords, 1 July 2008; Vol. 703, c. 228-29.]
	When we look at what actually happened in another place, we discover thatrather contrary to the impression given by the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehamptonthere was an extremely prescriptive Tory amendment, followed by Liberal Democrat criticism of the extent of the prescriptiveness and by a Liberal Democrat amendment featuring much more flexibility, which was commended by the Conservatives and which they supported when it became a Government amendment and was accepted by another place as a whole.
	There was another interesting aspect of the views of the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton and, perhaps, his reservations about pressing his points too strongly. He quoted from various publications, including  The Times Educational Supplement, which had reported some of the things that teachers' leaders had said over the last week or so. I noted that one quotation was missing. The hon. Gentleman smiles modestlysheepishly, even. That is because he knows very well which quotation I mean. It is the quotation from his favourite principal of his favourite school, which he mentions frequently. I refer to Mossbourne academy in Hackney, which the hon. Gentleman cited with appropriate reverence earlier. He was referring to an excellent school, but why did he not refer to the quotation from Sir Michael Wilshaw, its head? According to the front page of this week's  TES, he said that
	schools would not have to alter what they were already doing for pupil voice,
	because so many are already, in very appropriate ways, consulting the pupil body, and presumably the academy as well. The hon. Gentleman also mentioned the Education Act 2002, which already places obligations on schools to consult.

Nick Gibb: This is the point, is it not? Schools are probably already doing that, but what burdens heads and other teachers is the introduction of more statutory obligations to read and understand, and the requirement to assess whether their schools are fulfilling those obligations. That is the problem with putting requirements such as this into law.

David Laws: Surely the issue, as Lord Elton put it, is whether there is sufficient flexibility in the amendment. Presumably it was the fact that Lord Elton and his noble Friends were persuaded of the existence of such flexibility that caused the Conservative party in another place to give a fair wind to the proposals. The hon. Member for South Staffordshire (Sir Patrick Cormack) was rightly anxious for the responsibilities to consult with the student body not to become too onerous. I have no doubt that he has read Lords amendment No. 171, which is framed in very modest terms. It suggests that the governing bodies should invite the views of pupils and consider them. It is not prescriptive in relation to how that should be done, or about the acceptance of those views.

Patrick Cormack: The point is that this must be done. It will become a legal obligation. It is yet another legislative burden that we do not need to place on hard-pressed people whose sole aim is to run good schools.

David Laws: We all note the clear divisions in the Conservative party between the views expressed in this place and another place. I simply draw the hon. Gentleman's attention to the view of his noble Friends that there is enough flexibility in the amendment to allow for his concerns. He will also know that on 11 November Baroness Morgan put on the record in another place the specific areas in which there would be a requirement on schools to consult in different ways with pupils, and those certainly excluded issues such as staff appointments [Interruption.]

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. Mr. David Laws.

David Laws: Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am sure Members would not want to bring the discussion of this amendment to too early a close.
	I also invite Members to take reassurance in one other respect. The significance of the amendment will be heavily dependent on the regulations that are brought forward by the Minister on this point, and it will be quite possible for the Minister to make sure that they are drafted in such a way as to ensure the flexibility that all Members would wish for. I hope the Minister will be able to confirm that when the regulations are brought forward, they will embed the flexibility that all Members of this House want, and that ensured there was unanimity on this amendment in another place.

Jim Knight: The hon. Gentleman has made the case very well, and I do not need to detain the House for long. We have yet another U-turn from the Conservative party. It is not quite as rapid a U-turn as that which the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb) made on standard assessment tests, but it is extraordinary: Baroness Verma, who led for the Opposition on this in the Lords, said on 30 October that the amendment responded to the concerns of her noble Friend Lady Morris:
	The amendment has been tailored to meet that small concern and I am happy to offer my support for it[ Official Report, House of Lords, 30 October 2008; Vol. 704, c. 1743.],
	but the Tory Front-Bench team is voting against it now.
	I give the reassurance to the hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Laws) and my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Rob Marris) that we will consult social partners, schools and unions on what should be in the regulations. We have already said we do not intend to be prescriptive on matters such as staff or terms and conditions. This will be at a high level. The amendment will retain the flexibility everyone has been asking for, and it is bizarre and inflexible of the Opposition to want to vote against it.

Question put, That this House agrees with the Lords in the said amendment:
	 The House divided: Ayes 288, Noes 120.

Question accordingly agreed to.
	 Lords amendments Nos. 172 to 215 agreed to

DELEGATED LEGISLATION

Madam Deputy Speaker: I propose to put together motions 4 and 5.
	 Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 118(6) ( Delegated Legislation Committees ),

Criminal Law

That the draft Youth Justice Board for England and Wales (Amendment) Order 2008, which was laid before this House on 22nd October, be approved.

Constitutional Law

That the draft National Assembly for Wales (Legislative Competence) (Social Welfare and Other Fields) Order 2008, which was laid before this House on 15th October, be approved.  [Ian Lucas.]
	 Question agreed to.

TREASURY

Ordered,
	That Mr Philip Dunne be discharged from the Treasury Committee and Mr Stephen Crabb be added. [Rosemary McKenna, on behalf of the Committee of Selection. ]

PETITION

Further Education (Wirral)

Ben Chapman: Although the residents of Eastham are much concerned about the effect on their lives and environment of the proposed development of a Biossence waste recovery plant and an Agri Energy biofuel plant, they are also concerned about keeping the good things that they have. Some 110 of those residents have petitioned against the closure of Carlett Park campus during the brief period of opportunity for them so to do. Their petition states:
	The Petition of residents of Wirral,
	Declares that the proposed closure of Carlett Park Campus, a major site of Wirral Metropolitan College, would have a detrimental effect on current further education provision in South Wirral and beyond, would present difficulties to those wishing to pursue further education courses at Wirral Metropolitan College, fails to take account of the history and local importance of the site, and would discriminate against those whose circumstances dictated against travelling to an alternative site further away from the Carlett Park campus.
	The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families to make representations to Wirral Metropolitan College to encourage the continued existence of the Carlett Park site.
	And the Petitioners remain, etc.
	[P000288]

HEALTH CARE (SUTTON)

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn. [Ian Lucas.]

Paul Burstow: A little earlier, when I walked into the Chamber, I was overwhelmed by the pleasure that Members displayed on seeing me. I think that it had something to do with the earliness of the hour and the opportunity they would have to get on with other business on behalf of constituents.
	I am grateful for the opportunity to raise the issue of health care in my constituency and in the wider borough of Sutton, and my hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) hopes to contribute to the debate if he can. I shall start with some geography. Although my constituency is called Sutton and Cheam, the area known as Worcester Park makes up a large part of it. Many of my constituents feel that because it is not included in the name of the constituency, it is often overlooked. I wish to ensure that that is not the case in this debate.
	There are real concerns about the quality and accessibility of primary, acute and mental health care in the London borough of Sutton and in particular in my constituency. I wish to raise five issues with the Minister in this debate. The first is the need for an early decision on the funding for Better Healthcare Closer to Home in general, and the new patient block at St. Helier in particular. The Minister will know from meetings that we have had that this issue is close to my heart and of considerable concern and interest to my constituents.
	Secondly, I want to talk about the future governance arrangements for the Epsom and St. Helier trust and the constituent parts of that trust. Thirdly, I want to draw attention to the shortage of GP cover in the Worcester Park part of my constituency. This has been an issue for some time, which is why I am mentioning it tonight. Fourthly, I want to register some concerns about mental health services and their developmentor lack of it. Finally, I want to raise the future of the Sutton hospital site.
	Better Healthcare Closer to Home is a programme that has been worked up by the local acute trust, Epsom and St. Helier, the Sutton and Merton PCT, Surrey PCT and others over the last five or six years. A great deal of time and taxpayers' money has been spent on endless rounds of stakeholder engagement, citizen juries, consultation, strategies, plans, designs, the redrawing of those designs andof courseconsultants, to little apparent effect over the last 10 years. Although Better Healthcare Closer to Home is the current programme, there have been previous exercises with various titles, including Investing in Excellence. All those programmes have attempted to grapple with problems such as providing more health care outside general hospital settings and in the community, to bring more health care, diagnostics and other treatments closer to where people live.
	Many of us welcome such ideas, but it is also recognised that long-overdue investment is needed in the general hospital at St. Helier. I say that many of us recognised that, but not all of us did, and part of the reason why the process has taken so long is that that view was not generally held for some considerable time. As a result, we have had much to-ing and fro-ing over where a new general hospital might be built. I am pleased to say that we now have a conclusion, which is that it should remain where it is, at St. Helier, and that that is where the investment is needed.
	For the period 2004-08 more than 4 million has been spent on the Better Healthcare Closer to Home programme. That money has not built anything, but it has produced reams and reams of paper. So far, it has not delivered anything. We will never know how much was spent on the abortive work on Investing in Excellence, because as the trust said in reply to a freedom of information request,
	any invoices related to this project will have been destroyed.
	We will therefore never know precisely what costs were incurred, but we do know thatsince 2000 when the St. Helier and Epsom hospitals merged into a single trust7.7 million has been spent on consultants. We do not know whether all that consultancy related to these programmes.
	As a result of all these delays, while Kingston, St. George's in Tooting and even the Mayday hospital in Croydon have seen investment, St. Helier has sat perched on the hill overlooking south London, with paint peeling, marking time, waiting for a future.

Tom Brake: My hon. Friend may remember that some new investment went into St. Helier hospitalfor a new fountain at the entrance.

Paul Burstow: My hon. Friend is correct: we have seen investment in a much needed fountain at the front of the hospital. I am sure that it has been uplifting to the spirits of many of our constituents who have passed through its doors, although they would probably have preferred to see investment in the buildings.

Andrew Pelling: Residents in Croydon obviously have a real interest in health care in the constituencies of the hon. Members for Sutton and Cheam (Mr. Burstow) and for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake), who have been conscientious about raising these issues in the House. Is not the problem that we have seen uncertainty about health provision in that part of south London? Now is the time to invest, but the only investment in St. Helier hospital will be in Ferguson house. In many ways, perhaps because of the university and training hospitals elsewhere in London, our area suffers from a lack of investment. Our residents in Croydon and Sutton therefore end up being short-changed.

Paul Burstow: The hon. Gentleman makes some fair points about the limbo that the health service in the London borough of Sutton has experienced for some time. At long last, however, the local NHS has come up with a plan that has secured the support of the joint overview and scrutiny committee, which comprises elected members from Merton, Sutton and Surrey, and local residents and local MPs, including the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh). That plan has been submitted as an outline business case to NHS London. The plan includes a brand new, state-of-the-art building that will replace Ferguson house and will house the majority of the hospital's wards and clinics. It also sees the establishment of a network of local care centresformerly known as care hospitalsthroughout Sutton and Merton.
	The investment at St. Helier in the new patient block is the keystone of the plan. Without it, the plans collapse, because they do not support the weight of the logic that drives them. Without that plan, my constituents will not get the 21st century health care to which they are entitled. What is urgently required now is a green light from the Governmentin the first instance, from NHS London and then from the Department for Health and the Treasuryto fund the 140 million cost of the new building. I fear that further delay could be fatal to the future of our general hospital.
	My second point concerns the future governance arrangements for Epsom and St. Helier hospitals. The trust is consulting on a range of options, including maintaining the status quo of the current arrangements for Epsom and St. Helier, and the possibility of an amicable divorce between the two hospitals. Having seen a succession of chief executives struggle to make the trust function as a single effective entity, I am convinced that a de-merger is the right way forward. Straddling the Greater London boundary, the trust finds itself pulled in at least two directions: south to meet the needs of north Surrey and north to meet the needs of Sutton and Merton. It is constantly being pulled by two strategic health authorities with different agendas, trying to meet the different aspirations and needs of different populations. It will always find it difficult to meet those aspirations as one corporate entity.
	Epsom and St. Helier was created by something of a shotgun marriage in 1999. At the time, the Department of Health saw the need to try to stabilise the financial situation in both trustsparticularly, as I understand it, in the Epsom Health Care NHS Trust, as it was at the timeand drove the change to a speedy conclusion. It certainly did not benefit from as much external scrutiny as local overview and scrutiny committees would give such changes today. The legacy of that shotgun marriage has been a decade of paralysis.
	De-merger would allow a St. Helier NHS trust, as it would become, to focus on meeting the needs of residents in Sutton and Merton, delivering long overdue investment in services and infrastructure. My only concern, however, is that a possible de-merger could derail investment at St. Helier and the implementation of Better Healthcare Closer to Home. My hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington and I have sought reassurances from the Epsom and St. Helier trust that that would not be the case, and we have heard warm words of encouragement. The trust believes that it would not undermine anything within the outline business case that has been submitted. I hope the Minister will be able to reassure me on that point. If we can secure the future of St. Helier and see the roll-out of Better Healthcare Closer to Home, that should create the necessary space to concentrate on other deficits in local primary care and mental health services in the Sutton area.
	That brings me to my third point. I have for some years now been dealing with constituents in Worcester Park who have experienced serious difficulties in obtaining access to a local GP's list. Indeed, I understand that constituents moving from the Sutton part of my constituency to Worcester Park often beg their GP to let them remain on their books for that very reason.
	Worcester Park could be described as a GP desert. When one crosses the Kingston and Sutton boundary, one will find no GP practice until one hits the London road. I believe that it is time that Sutton and Merton, as a primary care trust, took up its responsibilities to ensure a fair distribution of GP provision across the area and actively engaged with local residents in Worcester Park to gauge the true level of local need and to meet it appropriately. The trust has continued to argue for too long now that there is no problem, despite all the anecdotal evidence, the evidence from my mailbag and the views of some GPs in the area who have identified the problem. I hope that the Minister will encourage the primary care trust to take on that challenge and to engage with the local population on the issue.
	My fourth point relates to mental health. Again, reorganisation of mental health services in south-west London and sometimes weak health care leadershipparticularly in the pasthave left mental health services in the London borough of Sutton suffering from under-investment. There has been a lack of investment in developing supported living and supported employment and in building capacity in the private and voluntary sectors to provide a more diverse and appropriate community-based set of services for people with mental health problems and learning disabilities.
	A consortium of south-west London primary care trusts is on the verge of consulting on plans for acute provision that might lead to the loss of beds at the Chiltern wing on the Sutton hospital site in my constituency and their possible transfer to remote locations at either Tolworth or Springfield in Tooting. I do not support the loss of acute beds in the borough. I think that that would be bad for patients and for their carers and families. I strongly believe that the opportunity should be taken to break down the stigma around mental health by co-locating mental and physical health services on the same sites.
	Community mental health services could be co-located with local care centres. Indeed, that is suggested in the outline business case that has been submitted. The opportunity should similarly be taken to consider the possibility of locating acute mental health beds separately but on the St. Helier site. That should not be lost sight of in the necessary drive to get an outline business case signed off for the new patient block at St. Helier.
	Finally, question marks remain over the future of the Sutton hospital site. If Better Healthcare Closer to Home moves from theory to practice, and we start to see its implementation, that will leave a question mark hanging over the future of the Sutton site after 2016. That seems some way away, but my constituents feel that they need to know with some certainty that there are clear undertakings and processes surrounding how that site's future will be determined. They regard NHS land as precious, as I do. Once it has been built onparticularly once houses are built on itit is lost, which means that the huge opportunities are lost. Before it is lightly disposed of, the site's potential for future use by both the NHS and social care in my area should be actively explored. I hope that the Minister agrees that my constituents should have a chance to have their say in the future use of the site, to ensure that it meets local health care needs and addresses the running sore of spill-over parking on residential roads around the site.
	Sutton hospital has some prestigious neighbours: the Royal Marsden and the Institute of Cancer Research. They deliver world-class research and world-class treatment and care. The opportunity to expand science and to develop cancer services should not be missed. Already, the possibility of collaboration between the Marsden and local GPs is under discussion. The idea is to develop a new GP clinic on part of the site.
	Let me end where I began. Too much time, energy and money has been absorbed getting to this point, but we are here at last. Much now hangs on an early green light for the outline business case for St. Helier and for Better Healthcare Closer to Home. Those proposals unlock the opportunity to deal with mental health and primary care, and I hope that the decision can be taken soon.

Tom Brake: First, I apologise to my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam (Mr. Burstow) for arriving two minutes into his speech. I had anticipated that we would reach this point at 10 o'clock, so I had to hot-foot it in from my constituency to be here in time for the debate. I thank my hon. Friend for giving me a couple of minutes, and I shall not detain the Minister for longer than that.
	It is incumbent on my hon. Friend and me to confirm that there is some good news in Sutton. I am pleased that in Wallington, at the Shotfield health centre, we can see major works under way with lots of scaffolding. Significant progress is clearly being made and, in the next 18 months or so, we will see a large, new, purpose-built, fit-for-purpose health centre. It will replace the health centre that my family have used, which is completely inadequate at present. That will be a fantastic, positive and modern development and I want to praise the GPs for the way in which they have worked with local residents, local residents' groups and local councillors to come forward with a scheme that is acceptable to everyone locally.
	I also want to take this opportunity to praise Carshalton Fields surgery, which organised a vocal campaign on the issue of polyclinics, expressing support for continuing to operate as a local family practice. I welcome confirmation from the PCT that the surgery can continue to do that if it so chooses.
	I also welcome the Clean Your Hands campaign, which has been organised by the primary care trust. It is clearly beginning to have an impact both in the primary care trust and the acute trust. I do not know whether my hon. Friend has been to St. Helier hospital recently, but wherever one walks there are machines that dispense hand creams and that talk to people as they walk past, encouraging them to make use of them. That is a positive development.
	The final positive development is the substance of my hon. Friend's debate, and that is the proposed business case. My hon. Friend and I both await a positive outcome and the confirmation that the 140 million that will be required to enable that case to proceed will be forthcoming.

Andrew Pelling: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman and to the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Mr. Burstow) for letting me get involved in their party, because there are issues in south London that I should like to draw to their attention. There are much the same pressures in Croydon as in Sutton. The hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam pointed out that health needs and demands mean that much of the hospital care is drawn either south towards Epsom or northwards to serve the needs of people in the borough of Merton. In some ways, the same issue applies in Croydon, in that Mayday is quite northerly

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will not widen the debateit is about health care in Sutton, so he should relate his comments accordingly.

Andrew Pelling: I take that point, Madam Deputy Speaker. In the context of the pressures, we have to take cognisance of the need for relevant services across south London. Close to the constituency of the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam, and just over the border of Carshalton and Wallington, Purley hospital has not been able to be rebuilt either. As in the example of Mayday, there is a need to move it to the gateway site in central Croydon rather than its being in north Croydon.

Tom Brake: I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. He encourages me to stray slightly beyond the borders of the London borough of Sutton, which I am loth to do. I am sure his constituents have noted his intervention in the debate and the significant points he has made on their behalf.
	I have a couple of not such good news stories. A point was raised with both my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam and me by one of his constituents about the standard of care received by her elderly relative when she was in St. Helier hospital. Apparently my hon. Friend's constituent was asked by nurses whether she lived locally and when she confirmed that she did, she was asked to go home and get some pillows for her relative as there was a shortage in the hospital. Given that the funding the Government have provided the NHS has increased to the extent it has, which we admit, why is it still the case that some of the basicsthe fundamentals of carehave still not been addressed as we would like? The constituent described the care received by her elderly relative in hospital and it is not something that any of us would feel comfortable about if our relatives had experienced it. I cannot refer to the case in more detail because I have not checked whether my hon. Friend's constituent would be happy for me to mention anything more specific. None the less, some of the fundamentals have not been addressed.
	Again on the negative side, my hon. Friend referred to the de-merger. As he said, it could delay proceedings further, but what is more fundamentally dispiriting is that it is a recognition of the fact that the trust never succeeded in getting the Epsom and St. Helier hospitals and their consultants to work together effectively.
	My final point is a Sutton issue, albeit not specifically or solely, so I hope that the Minister will have been briefed about it. It relates to the Henderson hospital, a matter that my hon. Friend and I have discussed with a succession of Ministers for months, if not yearsit is ongoing. The fundamental issue, which has not been picked up by the Minister of State, the hon. Member for Corby (Phil Hope), who has most recently responded to us, is that an assessment of the effectiveness of the therapeutic model at the Henderson has still not been carried out. The Government say that they have looked at whether there has been replication of the modelthere hasyet the proposal is to cancel or abolish it without anyone having looked at whether it is effective. The Department of Health says that the therapeutic model has not proved itself because there is no evidence and that, because there is no evidence, we have to get rid of it. However, if anyone had been able to obtain some evidence, it might have confirmed that the therapeutic model was perfectly viable and the right approach.
	I may have surprised the Minister with that point, but I hope that he can write to my hon. Friend and me to confirm that when the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence considers at an international level the appropriateness of models such as the Henderson, it will look at the Henderson and identify hospitals and communities internationally that are doing similar things. That will confirm once and for all whether that type of therapeutic approach for people with personality disorders can work. At the moment the work has not been done, so it would be entirely wrong for the Government to get rid of that therapeutic model. The Minister may say that he is not responsible for that work, but I am sure that he would like in-depth research into the effectiveness of the model. I conclude on that point, but as my hon. Friend said, I hope we shall hear good news about the Better Healthcare Closer to Home project and that the team's proposal will be endorsed by NHS London, the Department of Health and eventually the Treasury so that the development can take place.

Ben Bradshaw: I congratulate the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Mr. Burstow) on securing the debate. I appreciate the comments that he and the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) have made.
	I begin by paying tribute to the NHS staff in and around Sutton for their hard work and dedication, as a result of which, with the Government's investment in the health service, the hon. Gentlemen's constituents are receiving better health care than ever. Waiting times are at record low levels, life expectancy and other health outcomes are higher than they have ever been and with more than half GP surgeries in the constituency of the Member for Sutton and Cheam now offering extended hours, it is easier to see a GP in Sutton than ever before. The latest annual report into NHS performance by the independent health watchdog the Healthcare Commission said that both the primary care trust responsible for organising services in the hon. Gentleman's constituency and his local hospitals have improved on their performance of last year.
	As the hon. Gentleman will appreciate, however, health care can never stand still. With advances in medical technology and treatment, the NHS has constantly to examine how it can best provide services to meet the needs and expectations of the public. There is also, as he understands and acknowledged in his speech, a long history to the debate over the best way to organise services in south-west London.
	We are now at the stage where proposals have at last been agreed, as the hon. Gentleman also graciously acknowledged. The proposals are supported not only by all the PCTs and acute trusts in the area that have an interest, but by the local Members of Parliament, with whom I have had discussions about the issues on a number of occasions in the past, and they have been unanimously supported by the local overview and scrutiny committeesthe local government representatives who scrutinise local health proposals and, if they feel the need, object to them.
	The local needs, local health review launched jointly by Epsom and St. Helier University Hospitals NHS Trust and the London strategic health authority will consider whether there are better ways of managing the two hospital sites, as the hon. Gentleman outlined, and better ways for the trust to meet the diverse health needs of his local communities. It will look at how it can ensure that patients access better services locally, and that the trusts continue to improve standards of care and meet their statutory obligations, while recruiting and retaining adequate staff and maintaining their continued professional development.
	The review is not exclusive to the trust and the London SHA. It involves three other partner organisations: Sutton and Merton primary care trust, Surrey PCT and the South East Coast strategic health authority. The organisations should be commended for working together in an effort to reach a workable solution that should meet the needs of the populations that they all serve; that is not always easy, when local considerations come into play. The local needs, local health review will be run by a project board, which will be made up of executive and non-executive directors from the five partner organisations and chaired by the London SHA. A project team of senior managers from the partner organisations will support the project board. The team will be led by a project director, who will report directly to the trust.
	It is hoped that the project board will meet in December for the first time. One of its first tasks will be to engage staff and volunteers in the review process to ensure that their concerns and views are taken into account. The project board should be in a position to deliver a formal report by the end of spring 2009. That should allow sufficient time for the review to take place, while the uncertainty surrounding the future of the two hospitals is resolved as quickly as possible. Of course, I understand the desire of the hon. Members for Sutton and Cheam and for Carshalton and Wallington to make rapid progress, but I hope that they understand that it is important to get things right, rather than move quickly to make changes that one might later regret.
	As the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam said, the Better Healthcare Closer to Home strategy is linked with the plans for Epsom and St. Helier University Hospitals NHS Trust. The strategy is led by Sutton and Merton PCT, in partnership with Epsom and St. Helier University Hospitals NHS Trust. Its aim is to reshape the whole health service in Sutton and Merton, so that it provides better quality health care, designed around the needs of local people.
	The programme proposes to create integrated health care services, based in a number of local care centres that are supported by a local acute hospital that provides core secondary services. The outline business case, referred to by the hon. Members for Sutton and Cheam and for Carshalton and Wallington, was submitted by Sutton and Merton PCT to NHS London on 23 October. It is a complex programme, comprising a number of projects, the largest of which, as the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam acknowledged, is the 152 million first phase of redevelopment of St. Helier hospital. Other projects include local care centres in the following locations: Nelson hospital, costing 19 million; St. Helier hospital, costing 15 million; and Wilson hospital, costing 10 million. There will also be an intermediate care centre on the Wilson hospital site, costing 12 million.
	In total, the projects for which approval is sought from the SHA have a capital value of 208 million. In addition to the suite of projects that I have just outlined, there are a further twoa local care centre at Wallington and an urgent care centre on the St. Helier sitewith a combined capital value of 18 million. As I am sure that the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam will appreciate, the assessment of all those projects has to be thorough, and the analysis must be robust. Capital advisory staff at the London SHA will collate responses and questions from the project board, and they will be sent to the PCT and trust in December. Subject to satisfactory responses by the trust and PCT to the questions raised, NHS London will take the case through its approval process in January 2009.
	Assuming that all goes to plan, and the proposals are approved by the SHA and my Department, the proposed timetable is as follows: the Wallington local centre should open in 2011, the Nelson and Wilson local care centres and the Wilson intermediate care centre will open in 2013, and the St. Helier local care centre and phase 1 of the site redevelopment will open in 2016. That timetable allows time for the development of detailed plans for final approval, the production and approval of full business cases for each element of the project, including Treasury approval for the St. Helier site, and the construction and commissioning of the buildings.
	The hon. Gentleman reminded me of his interest in a possible fifth local care centre, to be sited on the Sutton hospital site. I understand that the PCT is in preliminary discussions with the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust about possible options for the development of a different type of health facility on that site. Again, I hope that the hon. Member will appreciate that all the interested parties want to make sure that the proposals meet the needs of the local community, and that we provide first-class, sustainable services in surroundings that are fit for purpose and represent the modern, high-quality NHS.
	The hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington will have to forgive me; I was not briefed on the issue of the Henderson hospital site. However, I will ensure that he gets a response on the subject from my fellow Minister of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Corby (Phil Hope), who is responsible for mental health matters. On the complaint that he mentioned about services provided at Epsom general hospital

Tom Brake: St. Helier hospital.

Ben Bradshaw: I beg the hon. Gentleman's pardon. I am sure that he will encourage his constituent to make a formal complaint, if they have not already done so. We have an independent, robust complaints system in place, and it is important that Members of Parliament encourage constituents who have such cases to take it up, not least because hospitals' performance is judged not only on the number of complaints that they receive, but on how they respond to them.
	The hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam also raised the issue of the provision of mental health services, and mental health beds, in his constituency. The London SHA informs me that the number of mental health beds has gone down in his area, as investment in community services has risen across west London. That pattern is replicated across the country. The four PCTs in the five boroughs served by the South West London and St. George's Mental Health NHS Trust have recently started work on a joint strategic plan for in-patient services across all care groups. That includes plans for Sutton hospital and mental health in-patient services. Sutton and Merton PCT is leading on that work, which is likely to lead to consultation on a range of options in the spring of 2009, with decisions expected next summer. Those options are likely to include some that retain mental health beds in Sutton and others that transfer them to other boroughs. I encourage him to be closely involved in that consultation process so that he can be reassured that his voice is heard.

Tom Brake: Could the Minister confirm on the record that he would expect accessibility of mental health services to be just as important as accessibility of other health services? The whole proposal, Better Healthcare Closer to Home, is about making general health services more readily accessible to local people, and that must also be the case for mental health services.

Ben Bradshaw: The hon. Gentleman is right that any organisation of services has to take access into account, and national guidelines will be laid down to ensure that that happens. However, the decision as to how best that is done on the ground is taken by the local health service. If there are fundamental and comprehensive changes to how services are organised in any particular area, it is open to him, or to the local councillors in that area, to raise objections through the overview and scrutiny and independent reconfiguration process, and I encourage them to do so if they are concerned about it. As the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam knows, the issues to do with the provision of these services are for his local health trust to resolve, and I encourage him and other hon. Members with an interest to engage in that process.
	The hon. Gentleman raised a problem in part of his constituency about density of GPs. I will have a word with the primary care trust about that, but I urge him to maintain the pressure on it. It is important that PCTs take GP access seriously to ensure that no members of the public are disadvantaged by a shortage of GPs in a particular area. As I am sure that he will appreciate, overall investment in primary care, as in all health services, is increasing year on year. That is the responsibility of PCTs, which will now be measured and ranked, not least on how they provide these services to deliver them in a proper and fair way.
	I hope that this debate has gone some way towards reassuring the hon. Gentleman that the proposals for Epsom and St. Helier, and for local care developments as part of Better Healthcare Closer to Home, are moving forward. NHS London has advised me, in response to another question that he raised, that Better Healthcare Closer to Home and the local needs, local health review are unrelated. One does not depend on another, the first being about service development and the second being about organisational management arrangements. The local needs, local health review should have no significant impact on any aspect of Better Healthcare Closer to Home. I am meeting the chief executive of NHS London tomorrow, and I will ensure that she is aware that this debate has happened. Matters are still ongoing in relation to the local needs, local health review. Any decisions taken about the future of Epsom and St. Helier, whether it remains as one trust or becomes two separate trusts, will be subject to consultation, and, as the hon. Gentleman asked, the views of local people will be considered before any final decisions are made.
	 Question put and agreed to.
	 Adjourned accordingly at twenty-three minutes to Nine o'clock.